HOLY SHIT. I am in the throes of being deeply discombobulated. This is a real time report (or would have been, had I not given up and abandoned it until another day, this day, which is today, right now. Which makes this part “real time”, I guess. Or not. Oh, fuck it.) My daughter, who is twelve, is having her birthday party tonight. I was JUST twelve. Not temporally speaking, of course. But it seems like I was just twelve. And they are doing all the shite I DID as a twelve year old, but they are doing it up Twenty-First Century style. Youtube changes everything. And I am baking brownies for them, because I am The Mom. HOLY SHIT.
Now they are making a video and writing some sort of rap. They are rapping, about God Knows What. Here is an overheard bit of conversation that occurred between two young party guests and Qwanty, Jr., courtesy of the Brain Scientist:
Young party guest: What rhymes with hair?
Other young party guest: Mare!
Qwanty, Jr.: Sare!
The BS reported this to me, confused: How are they possibly going to work that into a song?
How indeed. And seriously, junior. Sare? SARE? Jesus, child. That’s not even a word. It is at best an acronym. And frankly, I don’t think you know that.
Monday, September 29, 2008
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
add it up
Although I am pursuing an advanced degree in something I shall refer to today as the “quantitative arts”, I will admit that I have a difficult time wrapping me head around numbers that are intended to quantify things. Hey. I accidentally typed me instead of my. It also seems that the me of the typed word has a difficult time refraining from sounding like a pirate. Arrrr. But wait. I was saying something about numbers – specifically those that are intended to quantify things – being problem for me. That’s no good. I mean, really, aren’t all numbers generally expected to act in a quantifying capacity?
Anyway. Take, for example, the distance from the earth to the sun. I can’t recall the exact number, but I can assure you that is a very large number of miles away. Wait. The Brain Scientist just happened by and informed me that it’s 93,000,000 miles. That’s NINETY THREE MILLION. Thank you, Brain Scientist. I DON’T REMEMBER ASKING YOU A GODDAMN THING. But thank you. That’s a lot of miles.
Another example:
The number 5.
Five. That is the number of Peeps that constitutes an entire serving of Peeps. I read this on the side of the Peeps packaging last Spring, when I was at my absolute most pregnant and desiring sugar coated marshmallows in vast quantities. Even in this rotund, marshmallowy-ravenous state, I was only able to choke down two-thirds of a bunny-shaped Peep. When I bit off its ears I was in heaven, and was concerned that a single package was not going to be enough to satisfy my Peep needs. Despite my initial exuberance, however, by the time I had consumed its midsection, down to the area where its marshmallowy bunny genitals might reside, I thought I might throw up on myself. Yet the good people at Peeps informed me via the nutritional information that I could have FIVE ENTIRE PEEPS and still feel like I was well within the normal range of Peep consumption. That’s a whole four and one-thirds Peeps more than I was able to consume at the pinnacle of my Peeps jones. That’s a lot of Peeps.
Also mind-boggling:
The number 4.
Four. That’s the number of quadruple vodkas John Bonham drank the morning of the day he died. I will walk you through this. That’s four times four shots of vodka, at breakfast. That’s SIXTEEN shots of vodka. SIXTEEN. With ham. Or maybe eggs. And then he went and played the drums. After having sixteen shots of vodka. And HAM. Or perhaps EGGS. And then he drank some more. Now, I have, in my day, consumed some vodka. I have also had some ham, as well as some eggs. And outside of the morning-after hair of the dog bloody mary, rarely have I had them all at the same time in a fashion that was designed to satisfy both my need for an omelet and my need to get drunk. And on those rare occasions that I have indulged in such a fashion? Never have I done anything beyond spending the better part of my day – or perhaps the next day – in a puddle of regret. I certainly haven’t done anything like play the drums. It’s no wonder things ended badly for John. Four quadruple shots. That’s a lot of vodka.
So close:
The number 3.
Three. That’s the number of brothers Gibb that comprise the Bee Gees. I understand that this is also the number of brothers that make up the Jonas Brothers. I have two sons! I just need a third, and I will have the makings of a boy band. As both of the above mentioned bands have demonstrated, it is only necessary that ONE of the band members be vaguely good-looking. I can probably do that! I just need to gestate one more son, and when they reach adolescence I can drape them with medallions or promise rings (promise rings! They just scream Abstinence! And also Unprotected Anal Sex! Hey. Read the research!) and other trappings of boy bandiness and then I will no longer need to worry about my success in the quantitative arts. Hooray!
Perplexing:
The number 2.
Two. That is the number of items that have gone missing from my refrigerator in the last 24 hours. First on the AWOL list is a container of cream cheese, used this morning during the preparation of a sandwich. Second on the list is a bunch of spinach. A box, actually, half of which was used in last night’s salad. WHERE HAVE THEY GONE? Dr. BS denied having any information about their whereabouts. I suggested that he had perhaps absconded with them and used them to create a make-shift vagina for times when he’s lonely (although I didn’t actually call it “a make-shift vagina”. I won’t say what I did actually call it, because, you know, search engines and irrational paranoia and all.) He laughed at this suggestion. Yes, laughed – a little too hard, if you ask me.
Alarming:
The number 1:
One. This is the number of warnings that have been issued to me with regard to the safe deployment of pepper. DO NOT GRIND OVER STEAMING POTS. It is printed on the side of my pepper grinder. I would also like it printed on a tee shirt. Note to all: Do not grind qwanty over steaming pots.
Anyway. Take, for example, the distance from the earth to the sun. I can’t recall the exact number, but I can assure you that is a very large number of miles away. Wait. The Brain Scientist just happened by and informed me that it’s 93,000,000 miles. That’s NINETY THREE MILLION. Thank you, Brain Scientist. I DON’T REMEMBER ASKING YOU A GODDAMN THING. But thank you. That’s a lot of miles.
Another example:
The number 5.
Five. That is the number of Peeps that constitutes an entire serving of Peeps. I read this on the side of the Peeps packaging last Spring, when I was at my absolute most pregnant and desiring sugar coated marshmallows in vast quantities. Even in this rotund, marshmallowy-ravenous state, I was only able to choke down two-thirds of a bunny-shaped Peep. When I bit off its ears I was in heaven, and was concerned that a single package was not going to be enough to satisfy my Peep needs. Despite my initial exuberance, however, by the time I had consumed its midsection, down to the area where its marshmallowy bunny genitals might reside, I thought I might throw up on myself. Yet the good people at Peeps informed me via the nutritional information that I could have FIVE ENTIRE PEEPS and still feel like I was well within the normal range of Peep consumption. That’s a whole four and one-thirds Peeps more than I was able to consume at the pinnacle of my Peeps jones. That’s a lot of Peeps.
Also mind-boggling:
The number 4.
Four. That’s the number of quadruple vodkas John Bonham drank the morning of the day he died. I will walk you through this. That’s four times four shots of vodka, at breakfast. That’s SIXTEEN shots of vodka. SIXTEEN. With ham. Or maybe eggs. And then he went and played the drums. After having sixteen shots of vodka. And HAM. Or perhaps EGGS. And then he drank some more. Now, I have, in my day, consumed some vodka. I have also had some ham, as well as some eggs. And outside of the morning-after hair of the dog bloody mary, rarely have I had them all at the same time in a fashion that was designed to satisfy both my need for an omelet and my need to get drunk. And on those rare occasions that I have indulged in such a fashion? Never have I done anything beyond spending the better part of my day – or perhaps the next day – in a puddle of regret. I certainly haven’t done anything like play the drums. It’s no wonder things ended badly for John. Four quadruple shots. That’s a lot of vodka.
So close:
The number 3.
Three. That’s the number of brothers Gibb that comprise the Bee Gees. I understand that this is also the number of brothers that make up the Jonas Brothers. I have two sons! I just need a third, and I will have the makings of a boy band. As both of the above mentioned bands have demonstrated, it is only necessary that ONE of the band members be vaguely good-looking. I can probably do that! I just need to gestate one more son, and when they reach adolescence I can drape them with medallions or promise rings (promise rings! They just scream Abstinence! And also Unprotected Anal Sex! Hey. Read the research!) and other trappings of boy bandiness and then I will no longer need to worry about my success in the quantitative arts. Hooray!
Perplexing:
The number 2.
Two. That is the number of items that have gone missing from my refrigerator in the last 24 hours. First on the AWOL list is a container of cream cheese, used this morning during the preparation of a sandwich. Second on the list is a bunch of spinach. A box, actually, half of which was used in last night’s salad. WHERE HAVE THEY GONE? Dr. BS denied having any information about their whereabouts. I suggested that he had perhaps absconded with them and used them to create a make-shift vagina for times when he’s lonely (although I didn’t actually call it “a make-shift vagina”. I won’t say what I did actually call it, because, you know, search engines and irrational paranoia and all.) He laughed at this suggestion. Yes, laughed – a little too hard, if you ask me.
Alarming:
The number 1:
One. This is the number of warnings that have been issued to me with regard to the safe deployment of pepper. DO NOT GRIND OVER STEAMING POTS. It is printed on the side of my pepper grinder. I would also like it printed on a tee shirt. Note to all: Do not grind qwanty over steaming pots.
wik-ed
originally posted July 16, 2008
I have a mental list of things to look up on Wikipedia. It's a very short list though, since my mental area is not a very good place to store things. Here are the two most recent items:
1) Dinah Shore
I'm not really sure what the deal with Burt Reynolds and Dinah Shore was. Every time I see a documentary on Burt Reynolds there is a mention of their relationship. Wait. Every time? That doesn't seem right. I don't watch much television, and it certainly can't be the case that a significant portion of my viewing time is devoted to Burt Reynolds related material. How often can this have possibly happened? Also: documentary? That doesn't seem right either. Who is making Burt Reynolds documentaries? It can't be the case that I am watching Burt Reynolds documentaries. Anyway: Dinah Shore. She and Burt Reynolds had some sort of special relationship. This warms my cockles. It should be noted that my cockles have a very low threshold for what constitutes warming.
2) Vomitorium
I was wondering about the whole vomitorium thing the other day in the car: What were they like? When did they go out of vogue? Why did they go out of vogue? It seems like the process of gorging oneself followed by orally evacuating oneself is a decent idea. I realize that this pretty much sums up bulimia, but I must confess that I see some appeal in that as well, and am a bit surprised that I haven't gone that way at some point in my existence. Shut up. I never claimed to be of the best mental health, okay? Just shut up.
Anyway. I was wondering about vomitoriums, and since I figured I would forget that the subject held a place on my List of Things to Ask Wikipedia, I decided to ask Dr. Brain Scientist:
Vomitoriums, I said. What do you know about them?
Well, he replied. You know I wrote a play called 'The Vomitorium', don't you? So actually I know quite a bit about them.
Actually I did not know that. Or perhaps I did, but I chose to forget.
He went on from there to tell me all about vomitoriums, and also about The Vomitorium. The latter of these was based on his days as a bouncer at a certain local establishment that sold certain types of books and videos, and was also a place that one could come if one hoped to meet a like-minded individual interested in fucking in a video booth at said establishment. Yes! And for a very brief period his days as a bouncer included cleaning, and by this I mean "cleaning", the video booth. It turns out that "cleaning" involves wearing a special suit and carrying a special spray bottle of solvent but not actually entering the video booth for the process of cleaning. Rather, one stands a respectable distance from the doorway of the booth and sprays the solvent in the general direction of the room because one is only a bouncer for Christ's sake and this was not part of the job description. Yes. I agree. Eeew on all counts. How could I, as a person who is ooked out by others' uninvited bodily goo, have possibly gotten involved with a man who was paid to purportedly clean up such things?
Jesus, I need a drink. I mean another drink.
***
Other things I'd like to know, but can't ask Wikipedia:
1) Was there a time in my life when I could go out for sushi and not find myself commanding four times for a dining companion to TAKE THE CHOPSTICKS out of their nose? I feel like there was, but it was oh so long ago.
2) When is Shaggy going to stop singing that Hot Cross Buns song on the junior Brain Scientist's Scooby Doo video game? No, I do not want to buy your sweet buns, Shaggy, no matter how many times you ask me, and frankly, you are making my hot buns pretty goddamn cross. Shut up already.
3) Who drank my beer? Who is going to get me another one?
***
P.S. – The Brain Scientist just read the part of this in which I described his time as spunk swabber, and he wants me to mention that he worked there for several years and that this only happened for a short period of time and that he left the establishment soon after spunk swabber was added to his list of job responsibilities. Do not look down your nose at him and call him Spoo Boy! It is Doctor Spoo Boy.
I have a mental list of things to look up on Wikipedia. It's a very short list though, since my mental area is not a very good place to store things. Here are the two most recent items:
1) Dinah Shore
I'm not really sure what the deal with Burt Reynolds and Dinah Shore was. Every time I see a documentary on Burt Reynolds there is a mention of their relationship. Wait. Every time? That doesn't seem right. I don't watch much television, and it certainly can't be the case that a significant portion of my viewing time is devoted to Burt Reynolds related material. How often can this have possibly happened? Also: documentary? That doesn't seem right either. Who is making Burt Reynolds documentaries? It can't be the case that I am watching Burt Reynolds documentaries. Anyway: Dinah Shore. She and Burt Reynolds had some sort of special relationship. This warms my cockles. It should be noted that my cockles have a very low threshold for what constitutes warming.
2) Vomitorium
I was wondering about the whole vomitorium thing the other day in the car: What were they like? When did they go out of vogue? Why did they go out of vogue? It seems like the process of gorging oneself followed by orally evacuating oneself is a decent idea. I realize that this pretty much sums up bulimia, but I must confess that I see some appeal in that as well, and am a bit surprised that I haven't gone that way at some point in my existence. Shut up. I never claimed to be of the best mental health, okay? Just shut up.
Anyway. I was wondering about vomitoriums, and since I figured I would forget that the subject held a place on my List of Things to Ask Wikipedia, I decided to ask Dr. Brain Scientist:
Vomitoriums, I said. What do you know about them?
Well, he replied. You know I wrote a play called 'The Vomitorium', don't you? So actually I know quite a bit about them.
Actually I did not know that. Or perhaps I did, but I chose to forget.
He went on from there to tell me all about vomitoriums, and also about The Vomitorium. The latter of these was based on his days as a bouncer at a certain local establishment that sold certain types of books and videos, and was also a place that one could come if one hoped to meet a like-minded individual interested in fucking in a video booth at said establishment. Yes! And for a very brief period his days as a bouncer included cleaning, and by this I mean "cleaning", the video booth. It turns out that "cleaning" involves wearing a special suit and carrying a special spray bottle of solvent but not actually entering the video booth for the process of cleaning. Rather, one stands a respectable distance from the doorway of the booth and sprays the solvent in the general direction of the room because one is only a bouncer for Christ's sake and this was not part of the job description. Yes. I agree. Eeew on all counts. How could I, as a person who is ooked out by others' uninvited bodily goo, have possibly gotten involved with a man who was paid to purportedly clean up such things?
Jesus, I need a drink. I mean another drink.
***
Other things I'd like to know, but can't ask Wikipedia:
1) Was there a time in my life when I could go out for sushi and not find myself commanding four times for a dining companion to TAKE THE CHOPSTICKS out of their nose? I feel like there was, but it was oh so long ago.
2) When is Shaggy going to stop singing that Hot Cross Buns song on the junior Brain Scientist's Scooby Doo video game? No, I do not want to buy your sweet buns, Shaggy, no matter how many times you ask me, and frankly, you are making my hot buns pretty goddamn cross. Shut up already.
3) Who drank my beer? Who is going to get me another one?
***
P.S. – The Brain Scientist just read the part of this in which I described his time as spunk swabber, and he wants me to mention that he worked there for several years and that this only happened for a short period of time and that he left the establishment soon after spunk swabber was added to his list of job responsibilities. Do not look down your nose at him and call him Spoo Boy! It is Doctor Spoo Boy.
title: some sort of other title
originally posted June 25, 2008
The purpose of this is to share with you something that I think everyone should know about. And since somewhere between everyone and no one reads this, I thought I would share it here. This gets around the whole "directly interacting with other adults" thing that gets me so bugabooed. You are probably already aware of this thing I hope to share, as I sense you are hipper than I am, and so if this is the case, please just return to your usual activities and feel free to shake your head in disdain over what a rube I am.
First though, some self-indulgent tripe:
Greeting. Introduction of thing. Me. Me. Me. Complaint. Brain Scientist. Swear word. Complaint. Embarrassing yet ultimately pointless revelation. Me. More me. You? Now back to me. Misspelt werd. Vague attempt at humor. Did I mention me?
List of some sort:
1) Wank.
2) Waaaaank.
3) Squishy sound.
And then me. Ha ha. Child. Child. Vomit. Child. Vagina.
Unnecessary snippet of conversation:
Me: Huh?
Whoever: What?
Me: Yes!
Whoever: Indeed!
Me. You again. Me. Tangent. Reference to something in the nineteen eighties. Return to primary subject thing. More me. Sense that I am going nowhere with this. Increasing loss of interest in thing and stuff and spellink. Whatever.
Lackluster conclusion.
Swear word.
Fin.
***
Okey dokey! Now that we have that out of the way, please take a moment to view all the episodes of Yacht Rock:
http://www.channel101.com/shows/show.php?show_id=152
A very cool person who wears bus guy glasses shared this with me about a year ago at a gathering at my house. It took me some time to figure out what he was talking about because I was drinking tequila while trying to frost a cake:
Him: I said Yacht Rock.
Qwanty: What?
H: Yacht Rock!
Q: Huh?
H: Yacht Rock!
Q: Yurt…?
H: YACHT Rock!
Q: What kind of rock?
H: YACHT ROCK!
Q: Yot?
H: YAAAACHT! Like the BOAT!
Q: Ohhhhhhhh. Yacht Rock. ("Q" appears confused. "Q" eats frosting.)
***
So there you go. Yacht Rock. Gordon Bennett, have at it.
The purpose of this is to share with you something that I think everyone should know about. And since somewhere between everyone and no one reads this, I thought I would share it here. This gets around the whole "directly interacting with other adults" thing that gets me so bugabooed. You are probably already aware of this thing I hope to share, as I sense you are hipper than I am, and so if this is the case, please just return to your usual activities and feel free to shake your head in disdain over what a rube I am.
First though, some self-indulgent tripe:
Greeting. Introduction of thing. Me. Me. Me. Complaint. Brain Scientist. Swear word. Complaint. Embarrassing yet ultimately pointless revelation. Me. More me. You? Now back to me. Misspelt werd. Vague attempt at humor. Did I mention me?
List of some sort:
1) Wank.
2) Waaaaank.
3) Squishy sound.
And then me. Ha ha. Child. Child. Vomit. Child. Vagina.
Unnecessary snippet of conversation:
Me: Huh?
Whoever: What?
Me: Yes!
Whoever: Indeed!
Me. You again. Me. Tangent. Reference to something in the nineteen eighties. Return to primary subject thing. More me. Sense that I am going nowhere with this. Increasing loss of interest in thing and stuff and spellink. Whatever.
Lackluster conclusion.
Swear word.
Fin.
***
Okey dokey! Now that we have that out of the way, please take a moment to view all the episodes of Yacht Rock:
http://www.channel101.com/shows/show.php?show_id=152
A very cool person who wears bus guy glasses shared this with me about a year ago at a gathering at my house. It took me some time to figure out what he was talking about because I was drinking tequila while trying to frost a cake:
Him: I said Yacht Rock.
Qwanty: What?
H: Yacht Rock!
Q: Huh?
H: Yacht Rock!
Q: Yurt…?
H: YACHT Rock!
Q: What kind of rock?
H: YACHT ROCK!
Q: Yot?
H: YAAAACHT! Like the BOAT!
Q: Ohhhhhhhh. Yacht Rock. ("Q" appears confused. "Q" eats frosting.)
***
So there you go. Yacht Rock. Gordon Bennett, have at it.
warm fuzzies
originally posted June 23, 2008
I have some gruesome news not for the faint of heart: There are caterpillars in our bathroom. Dr. BS discovered three (!) the other day, all at once. Three! In the bathroom! ALL AT ONCE. One was floating around in the toilet, expired, one was found smushed under the bathroom rug, and one was CRAWLING AROUND RIGHT THERE OUT IN THE OPEN. And now this morning he found another one!
This is not good. I have an aversion to insects. Okay, not really an aversion, more of an irrational terror with regard to. I can tolerate ants in small numbers, and ladybugs are okay, but anything beyond that and I become a hot, sweaty mess. If my children are about I will try to appear calm and such, because one of my jobs as a mother is to prevent my assorted neuroses from becoming their assorted neuroses. However, if they are not around (as in, not directly in front of me), I will express open panic by way of frantic shrieks to the Brain Scientist or warbled, muted wails as I run, hand clasped over my mouth, to the place in the house that is furthest from the scene of the intrusion. Sometimes I will stand on my bed so that I can appraise the threat of an insect stampede. Sometimes I will do so while covering my ears with my hands, so as to protect them from potential entry by insects. EEEEEEEEEEEEE. I can barely type this.
Yesterday I was in a different bathroom, as I can no longer enter the Caterpillar Cave of Terror, for obvious reasons, and was startled by a cricket that leapt out at me from the shower curtain in a very menacing way. A cricket. I hate crickets. I try to imagine them wearing tiny spectacles and spats and carrying little canes and stuff but it JUST DOESN'T WORK. And because there was no three-year-old in the immediate vicinity to inspire me to police my behavior I called urgently (or perhaps screamed), Brain Scientist Brain Scientist Brain Scientist Brain Scientist Brain Scientist Brain Scientist Brain Scientist Brain Scientist Brain Scientist! And he came running in, totally disgusted when he discovered the source of my urgent call, not because he finds crickets offensive, but rather because he finds me and my irrational fear offensive. I thought you cut off your hand, he said. There's a cricket! I whispered in the horrified way of one who has just found a severed head. And then the Brain Scientists senior and junior went merrily about wrangling the cricket and escorting it outside, all the while enjoying a fun father-son moment as it tickled their hands and attempted to escape and crawled on my son's arm, covering him with CRICKET COOTIES. AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH!!!!!!
So anyway, there seems to be a caterpillar problem. I would say infestation, because four (!) seems like A LOT of caterpillars for one tiny room, but I'm afraid that some divine power will set my ass straight by teaching me about what truly constitutes an infestation. I fear I would not survive that.
Dr. BS has three theories as to how the caterpillars are getting into the bathroom, all of which stem from an overarching theory that the caterpillars are attempting to escape the ridiculous heat of Satan's Nethers:
1) They have come up through the drain, as we have not run the shower in this bathroom for some time.
2) They have come in on the cat, who hangs out in the bathroom. Early this morning I mis-remembered this theory, thinking that the BS had told me that they might have come in on him. This was a terrible thought to have as I lay next to him in bed – that the Brain Scientist was, unbeknownst to me, the Pied Piper of Caterpillars.
And finally, the most horrifying theory of all:
3) They fell from the bathroom fan over the toilet.
From the bathroom fan. Over the toilet.
CATERPILLARS falling from the bathroom fan over the toilet.
CATERPILLARS FALLING FROM THE SKY! ONTO ME! ONTO MY HEAD!! FALLING ONTO MY HEAD WHILE SITTING ON THE TOILET!!! MY HEAD, WHICH IS SUFFICIENTLY NERVOUS ENOUGH ALREADY, THANK YOU VERY MUCH!!!! AS INDICATED BY THE FACT THAT MY INSECT ANXIETY ALREADY MOTIVATES ME TO DO A THOUROUGH CHECK OF THE BASE OF THE TOILET REGION PRIOR TO SITTING DOWN IN AN EFFORT TO AVOID BEING SURPRISED BY A POTATO BUG OR MAYBE EVEN GOD FORBID A COCKROACH!!!!! HOLY FUCK!!!!!!
Of course, this has resulted in a great deal of twitchiness on my part, as I am continually experiencing the sensation that something is crawling on me and that things are falling on my head.
Oooooooh, I need a valium.
Fucking caterpillars.
I have some gruesome news not for the faint of heart: There are caterpillars in our bathroom. Dr. BS discovered three (!) the other day, all at once. Three! In the bathroom! ALL AT ONCE. One was floating around in the toilet, expired, one was found smushed under the bathroom rug, and one was CRAWLING AROUND RIGHT THERE OUT IN THE OPEN. And now this morning he found another one!
This is not good. I have an aversion to insects. Okay, not really an aversion, more of an irrational terror with regard to. I can tolerate ants in small numbers, and ladybugs are okay, but anything beyond that and I become a hot, sweaty mess. If my children are about I will try to appear calm and such, because one of my jobs as a mother is to prevent my assorted neuroses from becoming their assorted neuroses. However, if they are not around (as in, not directly in front of me), I will express open panic by way of frantic shrieks to the Brain Scientist or warbled, muted wails as I run, hand clasped over my mouth, to the place in the house that is furthest from the scene of the intrusion. Sometimes I will stand on my bed so that I can appraise the threat of an insect stampede. Sometimes I will do so while covering my ears with my hands, so as to protect them from potential entry by insects. EEEEEEEEEEEEE. I can barely type this.
Yesterday I was in a different bathroom, as I can no longer enter the Caterpillar Cave of Terror, for obvious reasons, and was startled by a cricket that leapt out at me from the shower curtain in a very menacing way. A cricket. I hate crickets. I try to imagine them wearing tiny spectacles and spats and carrying little canes and stuff but it JUST DOESN'T WORK. And because there was no three-year-old in the immediate vicinity to inspire me to police my behavior I called urgently (or perhaps screamed), Brain Scientist Brain Scientist Brain Scientist Brain Scientist Brain Scientist Brain Scientist Brain Scientist Brain Scientist Brain Scientist! And he came running in, totally disgusted when he discovered the source of my urgent call, not because he finds crickets offensive, but rather because he finds me and my irrational fear offensive. I thought you cut off your hand, he said. There's a cricket! I whispered in the horrified way of one who has just found a severed head. And then the Brain Scientists senior and junior went merrily about wrangling the cricket and escorting it outside, all the while enjoying a fun father-son moment as it tickled their hands and attempted to escape and crawled on my son's arm, covering him with CRICKET COOTIES. AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHH!!!!!!
So anyway, there seems to be a caterpillar problem. I would say infestation, because four (!) seems like A LOT of caterpillars for one tiny room, but I'm afraid that some divine power will set my ass straight by teaching me about what truly constitutes an infestation. I fear I would not survive that.
Dr. BS has three theories as to how the caterpillars are getting into the bathroom, all of which stem from an overarching theory that the caterpillars are attempting to escape the ridiculous heat of Satan's Nethers:
1) They have come up through the drain, as we have not run the shower in this bathroom for some time.
2) They have come in on the cat, who hangs out in the bathroom. Early this morning I mis-remembered this theory, thinking that the BS had told me that they might have come in on him. This was a terrible thought to have as I lay next to him in bed – that the Brain Scientist was, unbeknownst to me, the Pied Piper of Caterpillars.
And finally, the most horrifying theory of all:
3) They fell from the bathroom fan over the toilet.
From the bathroom fan. Over the toilet.
CATERPILLARS falling from the bathroom fan over the toilet.
CATERPILLARS FALLING FROM THE SKY! ONTO ME! ONTO MY HEAD!! FALLING ONTO MY HEAD WHILE SITTING ON THE TOILET!!! MY HEAD, WHICH IS SUFFICIENTLY NERVOUS ENOUGH ALREADY, THANK YOU VERY MUCH!!!! AS INDICATED BY THE FACT THAT MY INSECT ANXIETY ALREADY MOTIVATES ME TO DO A THOUROUGH CHECK OF THE BASE OF THE TOILET REGION PRIOR TO SITTING DOWN IN AN EFFORT TO AVOID BEING SURPRISED BY A POTATO BUG OR MAYBE EVEN GOD FORBID A COCKROACH!!!!! HOLY FUCK!!!!!!
Of course, this has resulted in a great deal of twitchiness on my part, as I am continually experiencing the sensation that something is crawling on me and that things are falling on my head.
Oooooooh, I need a valium.
Fucking caterpillars.
Monday, September 15, 2008
waiting
originally posted June 21, 2008
Wednesday night I went to see Tom Waits. I couldn't NOT go, after hearing Dr. BS's enthusiastic telling of The Tale of the Sights, Sounds, and Smells of the Tuesday Evening Show He Attended. Really, it was the smells that got me. He returned from Tuesday night's show all starry eyed and dazed, and it was clear he'd had a concert experience that had not only made his top ten list of The Greatest Concert Experiences of All Time, but also secured the number one spot on his list of The Worst Smelling Group of People I Have Ever Smelt. It should be noted that the BS spent a good portion of his life as a stinky hippie, so he has attended many, many shows, and has been around many, many, many smelly people. Can you see the appeal?
The problem I faced was not having a ticket to Wednesday night's show, much as I had not had a ticket to the Tuesday evening stinkfest that had so enchanted the doctor. You see, Tom Waits has a pretty devoted fanbase – a devoted, fedora-wearing, and apparently stench-laden fanbase. And as Tom Waits was only playing a smattering of shows on the Odor and Doom – oops, I mean Glitter and Doom – tour, we were in competition for tickets with very serious fans from all sorts of states, and these tickets sold out approximately four minutes after they went on sale. This was a sad event in our house, this realization that we would not be seeing Tom Waits. Later the afternoon the tickets went on sale, hours after The Sadness had descended upon our household, I tried again to get a single ticket while I was at "work". Lo and behold, I got a lone ticket in the balcony, and was able to phone Dr. BS and surprise him with the news, even though he had been a bit of a lippy-know-it-all-pain-in-the-ass that day and all I really wanted to do was tell his marrow-loving-blowhard-self to go suck on a bone. However, I like the guy, so instead I just called and told him the good news that he was going to the show.
Tuesday evening of the concert rolled around, and because this was a paperless ticket event, entry to the concert required the credit card that was used to purchase the ticket and valid picture id – I mean ID, as in identification. We were not all required to bring artist renditions of the uncoordinated instinctual trends of our psychic apparatuses. Apparati? Perhaps if each of us had been required to bring a picture of our id, we would at this moment have a better sense of why everyone smelled so weird. Anyway, this paperless ticket business required that the two small boys and I troop downtown to the concert venue with the Brain Scientist and stand in line with him and walk him to the door and wave around my credit card and identification and bid him adieu and troop back to the parking garage and drive all the way home and drink a hearty scottish amber upon our return, because it was 108 degrees outside. Fortunately, Mr. Wright volunteered to pick the BS up after the show, thus enabling the wee-uns and I to lounge around on the couch and watch the Muppet Show and drink a second hearty scottish amber and await his return, rather than venturing out into the dark hotness of Satan's Nethers for a second fun car ride.
Which brings us to the smells. It seems there were many of them. Rather than telling me too much about the actual show, as he was concerned that I might be overcome with melancholy having missed what had been a doozy of a concert, the doctor instead opted to focus on the very unique and offensive combination of smells the folks in attendance managed to generate. It seems that air conditioning was not functioning at optimum capacity, and so the balcony was filled with the smell of whiskey and cigarette sweat, with a touch of garlic. And then there was the dreadlocked guy that the BS stood behind in line at the bar as he waited to purchase a bit of whiskey in an effort to cultivate his own special smell. Dreads claimed to know Tom Waits' uncle. This is vaguely interesting because I knew a boy in my wayward youth named Will Waits who claimed that Tom Waits was his uncle. So I guess this means that Dreads knew Will Waits' great uncle. Small world. Anyhoo, it seems Dreads smelled pretty bad – indescribably bad. Of course, I was totally unimpressed when the BS offered this as an example of the stink. I mean, everyone expects a guy with dreadlocks to smell bad. We are disappointed with guys with dreadlocks who don't smell bad.
The BS then told me about a guy he encountered in the bathroom who was wearing plaid pants (Were they polyester? I asked. They had to be, he replied. The only doubt I have that they were polyester is the fact that this guy seemed like the sort who would wear wool pants when it was 108 degrees. No, they must have been polyester. They had a nice, crisp pleat), a beige suit vest, a grayish, well-worn shirt, and beige jazz shoes. Jazz shoes! Beige jazz shoes! He had a funny wispy beard, too, the sort that many adolescent males have no choice but to grow, and fully adult males, I don't know – cultivate? Finally – and you knew this was coming – he also carried upon his person a strange and horrible smell. I wanted to ask him, the BS reminisced, did you piss yourself after drinking gasoline? Did you throw up in your shoes? That's some smell! And some outfit! Dr. BS confirms this: It was like he caught a fungus from Funky Winkerbean. Alright! Now that's the sort of smell I can get behind, in a purely metaphorical sense!
Inspired by these anecdotes, and overcome with a desire to help the BS relive what was clearly a pretty awesome experience, I went online in an attempt to buy tickets to the following evening's show. It was just before midnight, and I guess some more tickets had been released, because moments later I was the proud owner of two third row orchestra seats. Seeing as there were just two rows ahead of us in the pit, this technically put us in the fifth row. Upon hearing this news, the BS did an excited little dance thing I have never, ever, ever seen him do. It was a side of him I'd not yet been acquainted with. Oh, the anticipation!
I'm sorry to report that Wednesday evening brought disappointment in the form of pleasantly breathable air and concert attendees who had all obviously bathed in the last fortnight. What the fuck? Dr. BS acknowledged that it was a very different crowd, both in terms of overall odor and general attractiveness. Yes, there was a decent fedora showing, but apparently not nearly as many as the night before. We saw Dreads again too, but didn't get close enough to smell him, because he was sitting two rows ahead of us, smack dab in the center, just as he had the night before. Maybe Tom Waits is his uncle. We also saw a guy, four rows back from us, who also had a sad, wispy beard despite that fact that he appeared to be a grown up, and he was playing a harmonica as we waited for the show to begin. Come on, dude, said the Brain Scientist, we don't need this level of detail about your persona. I am still laughing about this. Of course we were surrounded by people from other states who had flown in for the show. The couple next to us were from Alaska, and had spent the day shopping at thrift stores and eating at our very favorite Mexican restaurant. Stupid Alaskans! Stop buying our Tom Waits tickets and cool vintage dresses and eating our chimichangas! GO BACK TO YOUR IGLOOS!
Back to the fedoras. I counted 27, one of which was worn by a lady, and featured an elaborate plume of feathers.
As to the whiskey consumption. Did I have some? Hell yes, I did.
After the show we stood around outside, at least one of us counting fedoras and breathing deeply, hoping that someone would happen by who carried the legendary stink of the prior evening. No such luck. Later, as we started our journey to the car, we ran into the guy who owns one of the local bars that is a popular hangout with the drunken hipsters who inhabit the dry, dusty parts of Satan's Nethers. He was excited to see the Brain Scientist, who was for many, many years a regular patron of this bar. He slugged us both in the arm and offered to buy us a drink at a nearby bar. Of course we went, and over Sierra Nevada he explained to me that times are tough, necessitating that he jerk off the dog to feed the cat. Really?
And the concert? INCREDIBLE. Tom Waits puts on a very, very, very good show. I would get all smelly and run around in jazz shoes – beige jazz shoes – if he wanted me to. And that's saying a lot.
Wednesday night I went to see Tom Waits. I couldn't NOT go, after hearing Dr. BS's enthusiastic telling of The Tale of the Sights, Sounds, and Smells of the Tuesday Evening Show He Attended. Really, it was the smells that got me. He returned from Tuesday night's show all starry eyed and dazed, and it was clear he'd had a concert experience that had not only made his top ten list of The Greatest Concert Experiences of All Time, but also secured the number one spot on his list of The Worst Smelling Group of People I Have Ever Smelt. It should be noted that the BS spent a good portion of his life as a stinky hippie, so he has attended many, many shows, and has been around many, many, many smelly people. Can you see the appeal?
The problem I faced was not having a ticket to Wednesday night's show, much as I had not had a ticket to the Tuesday evening stinkfest that had so enchanted the doctor. You see, Tom Waits has a pretty devoted fanbase – a devoted, fedora-wearing, and apparently stench-laden fanbase. And as Tom Waits was only playing a smattering of shows on the Odor and Doom – oops, I mean Glitter and Doom – tour, we were in competition for tickets with very serious fans from all sorts of states, and these tickets sold out approximately four minutes after they went on sale. This was a sad event in our house, this realization that we would not be seeing Tom Waits. Later the afternoon the tickets went on sale, hours after The Sadness had descended upon our household, I tried again to get a single ticket while I was at "work". Lo and behold, I got a lone ticket in the balcony, and was able to phone Dr. BS and surprise him with the news, even though he had been a bit of a lippy-know-it-all-pain-in-the-ass that day and all I really wanted to do was tell his marrow-loving-blowhard-self to go suck on a bone. However, I like the guy, so instead I just called and told him the good news that he was going to the show.
Tuesday evening of the concert rolled around, and because this was a paperless ticket event, entry to the concert required the credit card that was used to purchase the ticket and valid picture id – I mean ID, as in identification. We were not all required to bring artist renditions of the uncoordinated instinctual trends of our psychic apparatuses. Apparati? Perhaps if each of us had been required to bring a picture of our id, we would at this moment have a better sense of why everyone smelled so weird. Anyway, this paperless ticket business required that the two small boys and I troop downtown to the concert venue with the Brain Scientist and stand in line with him and walk him to the door and wave around my credit card and identification and bid him adieu and troop back to the parking garage and drive all the way home and drink a hearty scottish amber upon our return, because it was 108 degrees outside. Fortunately, Mr. Wright volunteered to pick the BS up after the show, thus enabling the wee-uns and I to lounge around on the couch and watch the Muppet Show and drink a second hearty scottish amber and await his return, rather than venturing out into the dark hotness of Satan's Nethers for a second fun car ride.
Which brings us to the smells. It seems there were many of them. Rather than telling me too much about the actual show, as he was concerned that I might be overcome with melancholy having missed what had been a doozy of a concert, the doctor instead opted to focus on the very unique and offensive combination of smells the folks in attendance managed to generate. It seems that air conditioning was not functioning at optimum capacity, and so the balcony was filled with the smell of whiskey and cigarette sweat, with a touch of garlic. And then there was the dreadlocked guy that the BS stood behind in line at the bar as he waited to purchase a bit of whiskey in an effort to cultivate his own special smell. Dreads claimed to know Tom Waits' uncle. This is vaguely interesting because I knew a boy in my wayward youth named Will Waits who claimed that Tom Waits was his uncle. So I guess this means that Dreads knew Will Waits' great uncle. Small world. Anyhoo, it seems Dreads smelled pretty bad – indescribably bad. Of course, I was totally unimpressed when the BS offered this as an example of the stink. I mean, everyone expects a guy with dreadlocks to smell bad. We are disappointed with guys with dreadlocks who don't smell bad.
The BS then told me about a guy he encountered in the bathroom who was wearing plaid pants (Were they polyester? I asked. They had to be, he replied. The only doubt I have that they were polyester is the fact that this guy seemed like the sort who would wear wool pants when it was 108 degrees. No, they must have been polyester. They had a nice, crisp pleat), a beige suit vest, a grayish, well-worn shirt, and beige jazz shoes. Jazz shoes! Beige jazz shoes! He had a funny wispy beard, too, the sort that many adolescent males have no choice but to grow, and fully adult males, I don't know – cultivate? Finally – and you knew this was coming – he also carried upon his person a strange and horrible smell. I wanted to ask him, the BS reminisced, did you piss yourself after drinking gasoline? Did you throw up in your shoes? That's some smell! And some outfit! Dr. BS confirms this: It was like he caught a fungus from Funky Winkerbean. Alright! Now that's the sort of smell I can get behind, in a purely metaphorical sense!
Inspired by these anecdotes, and overcome with a desire to help the BS relive what was clearly a pretty awesome experience, I went online in an attempt to buy tickets to the following evening's show. It was just before midnight, and I guess some more tickets had been released, because moments later I was the proud owner of two third row orchestra seats. Seeing as there were just two rows ahead of us in the pit, this technically put us in the fifth row. Upon hearing this news, the BS did an excited little dance thing I have never, ever, ever seen him do. It was a side of him I'd not yet been acquainted with. Oh, the anticipation!
I'm sorry to report that Wednesday evening brought disappointment in the form of pleasantly breathable air and concert attendees who had all obviously bathed in the last fortnight. What the fuck? Dr. BS acknowledged that it was a very different crowd, both in terms of overall odor and general attractiveness. Yes, there was a decent fedora showing, but apparently not nearly as many as the night before. We saw Dreads again too, but didn't get close enough to smell him, because he was sitting two rows ahead of us, smack dab in the center, just as he had the night before. Maybe Tom Waits is his uncle. We also saw a guy, four rows back from us, who also had a sad, wispy beard despite that fact that he appeared to be a grown up, and he was playing a harmonica as we waited for the show to begin. Come on, dude, said the Brain Scientist, we don't need this level of detail about your persona. I am still laughing about this. Of course we were surrounded by people from other states who had flown in for the show. The couple next to us were from Alaska, and had spent the day shopping at thrift stores and eating at our very favorite Mexican restaurant. Stupid Alaskans! Stop buying our Tom Waits tickets and cool vintage dresses and eating our chimichangas! GO BACK TO YOUR IGLOOS!
Back to the fedoras. I counted 27, one of which was worn by a lady, and featured an elaborate plume of feathers.
As to the whiskey consumption. Did I have some? Hell yes, I did.
After the show we stood around outside, at least one of us counting fedoras and breathing deeply, hoping that someone would happen by who carried the legendary stink of the prior evening. No such luck. Later, as we started our journey to the car, we ran into the guy who owns one of the local bars that is a popular hangout with the drunken hipsters who inhabit the dry, dusty parts of Satan's Nethers. He was excited to see the Brain Scientist, who was for many, many years a regular patron of this bar. He slugged us both in the arm and offered to buy us a drink at a nearby bar. Of course we went, and over Sierra Nevada he explained to me that times are tough, necessitating that he jerk off the dog to feed the cat. Really?
And the concert? INCREDIBLE. Tom Waits puts on a very, very, very good show. I would get all smelly and run around in jazz shoes – beige jazz shoes – if he wanted me to. And that's saying a lot.
too many cooks
originally posted May 18, 2008
I volunteered to make dinner tonight, and just spent a bit of time perusing fajita recipes and their associated reviews at epicurious. The following review grabbed my attention:
04/08/08brandyannfoster from corvallis, or
This recipe has some good things about it..the lime and cilantro cabbage topping was good. Unfortunately the chicken marinade needed more spices in general. I may try again with a lot more garlic, some lime juice and some cumming in the marinade.
Huh. I must admit, I've never thought of doing this to liven up a dish. And, as it turns out, Julia Child advocates something that sounds disturbingly similar:
http://www.unknown.nu/julia/sounds/cups.mp3
Who knew? I guess I'll need the Brain Scientist's help after all.
I volunteered to make dinner tonight, and just spent a bit of time perusing fajita recipes and their associated reviews at epicurious. The following review grabbed my attention:
04/08/08brandyannfoster from corvallis, or
This recipe has some good things about it..the lime and cilantro cabbage topping was good. Unfortunately the chicken marinade needed more spices in general. I may try again with a lot more garlic, some lime juice and some cumming in the marinade.
Huh. I must admit, I've never thought of doing this to liven up a dish. And, as it turns out, Julia Child advocates something that sounds disturbingly similar:
http://www.unknown.nu/julia/sounds/cups.mp3
Who knew? I guess I'll need the Brain Scientist's help after all.
in which i complain, and also mention my vagina
originally posted May 9, 2008
Hello. What are you doing? I am sitting very still. Today, during a rather raucous display of ambulatory dexterity in which I walked from living room to bedroom, I discovered that I could no longer walk in the manner to which I am accustomed. One moment I was striding confidently along on my way to berate someone about something, one foot in front of the other, legs firmly attached to what seemed to be a fully functioning torso, and the next moment I was attempting to remain upright by clinging to a wall. In between these two moments I said something like Hey, my back really hurts. And hurt it did. It hurt so much that I acknowledged that the Brain Scientist was probably right when he pointed out that a trip to the doctor was in order. So, off to the doctor we went, where it was discovered that my pelvis, which was recently distorted thanks to the small person who came out of – have I mentioned this? – my VAGINA, has not returned to its usual perky, properly aligned self. Instead, it suffers from a fancy sounding ailment and is all lopsided and dysfunctional and requires physical therapy two times a week. It also requires narcotics and anti-inflammatory medications and steroids, none of which I can take because I am breastfeeding the small person who came out of my, well, you know. This all means that I can only take teeny mincing steps at a ridiculously slow rate, and only when absolutely necessary, and even this is no guarantee that I will not suddenly yelp and collapse on the floor in a writhing heap of pain and ill-fitting clothing. Fuckity fuck fuck fuck.*
*Spell check tells me that fuckity is not a word, and suggests that I instead try luckily, bucket, or fructify. Fructify, spell check? Fructify?
Hello. What are you doing? I am sitting very still. Today, during a rather raucous display of ambulatory dexterity in which I walked from living room to bedroom, I discovered that I could no longer walk in the manner to which I am accustomed. One moment I was striding confidently along on my way to berate someone about something, one foot in front of the other, legs firmly attached to what seemed to be a fully functioning torso, and the next moment I was attempting to remain upright by clinging to a wall. In between these two moments I said something like Hey, my back really hurts. And hurt it did. It hurt so much that I acknowledged that the Brain Scientist was probably right when he pointed out that a trip to the doctor was in order. So, off to the doctor we went, where it was discovered that my pelvis, which was recently distorted thanks to the small person who came out of – have I mentioned this? – my VAGINA, has not returned to its usual perky, properly aligned self. Instead, it suffers from a fancy sounding ailment and is all lopsided and dysfunctional and requires physical therapy two times a week. It also requires narcotics and anti-inflammatory medications and steroids, none of which I can take because I am breastfeeding the small person who came out of my, well, you know. This all means that I can only take teeny mincing steps at a ridiculously slow rate, and only when absolutely necessary, and even this is no guarantee that I will not suddenly yelp and collapse on the floor in a writhing heap of pain and ill-fitting clothing. Fuckity fuck fuck fuck.*
*Spell check tells me that fuckity is not a word, and suggests that I instead try luckily, bucket, or fructify. Fructify, spell check? Fructify?
lost in translation
originally posted April 27, 2008
Gah.
GAAAAAH.
You know what they say:
If you can't say anything nice, say something by way of back-translation via an online translating device.
In continuing to keep with that advice, I offer to my favorite federally funded grant group a few more sentiments:
The valuable program which is hated, I hate. Stop the fact that I of the surface am struck strongly.
In order to cut my fund thank you. Now my male it is inhale the chicken.
It is the mountain which gives out, one steam of badness of greeting. Me who load your penis of unfairness unfairness it is slow stop the fact that it sticks.
I will give a wee multipurpose tool to anyone who can guess what I'm really trying to say.
And by the way:
GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH.
Gah.
GAAAAAH.
You know what they say:
If you can't say anything nice, say something by way of back-translation via an online translating device.
In continuing to keep with that advice, I offer to my favorite federally funded grant group a few more sentiments:
The valuable program which is hated, I hate. Stop the fact that I of the surface am struck strongly.
In order to cut my fund thank you. Now my male it is inhale the chicken.
It is the mountain which gives out, one steam of badness of greeting. Me who load your penis of unfairness unfairness it is slow stop the fact that it sticks.
I will give a wee multipurpose tool to anyone who can guess what I'm really trying to say.
And by the way:
GAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH.
postscript
originally posted April 25, 2008
I would like to add the following postscript to the latter letter of my previous post. My attempts to include this as originally intended were thwarted by the fact that the computerized innards of this space are not worldly enough to understand Japanese characters. As such, what would have otherwise been a fine closing sentiment appeared as a string of question marks. To remedy this, I have enlisted the help of an online translator to back-translate my stinging closing remark into my native English. So, Federally Funded Grant Group, I say to you this:
You it is slow, apply your subsidy above straightly.
Take that, you Federally Funded, Trip to Japan Wrecking Motherfuckers.
I would like to add the following postscript to the latter letter of my previous post. My attempts to include this as originally intended were thwarted by the fact that the computerized innards of this space are not worldly enough to understand Japanese characters. As such, what would have otherwise been a fine closing sentiment appeared as a string of question marks. To remedy this, I have enlisted the help of an online translator to back-translate my stinging closing remark into my native English. So, Federally Funded Grant Group, I say to you this:
You it is slow, apply your subsidy above straightly.
Take that, you Federally Funded, Trip to Japan Wrecking Motherfuckers.
screwed
originally posted April 25, 2008
This is a brief note I wrote a few months ago:
Dear Federally Funded Grant Group,
I wanted to thank you most whole-heartedly for your understanding and willingness to accommodate me as I enter the final weeks of my pregnancy. Now that I've been advised to engage in some bed rest in order to hinder any possibility of premature delivery, I am grateful that you have offered to give me time off and stop paying me so that I am no longer eligible for the paid maternity leave I would have otherwise been entitled to had I remained employed for a full 20 hours per week prior to giving birth. Also, thank you for the wee multipurpose tool you gave me for Christmas this year. It makes me feel like part of the team, and the way it is printed with the federally funded project name will always make me think of you, Federally Funded Grant Group. I shall carry it on my keychain with pride. Such a practical gift, too – I'm sure the tiny screwdriver will come in handy whenever I feel like I'm getting totally screwed.
The best to you in 2008,
Qwanty
I never did anything with the letter however, as the situation resolved itself. People intervened, and I was placed in a research assistantship that would allow me to work from home as I felt fit – one that I was assured would fund me until my graduation.
Here is a letter I wrote this morning:
Dear Federally Funded Grant Group,
There is nothing one enjoys more than returning from maternity leave to discover that one no longer has a job. Imagine my delight at learning I would be employed with you for only a few more weeks! Thank you for not mentioning this to me until I asked you directly. It turned the discovery of my upcoming unemployed status into a wonderful surprise – the creamy middle of the stale ding dong that is my academic career. Also, kudos to you on your timing! I have already turned down other positions that would have been able to fill this gap. Furthermore, I was just this evening going to purchase a plane ticket to Japan so that I could attend a conference and present a poster. I won't be doing this now, as I can no longer afford it. Fortunately, one of my collaborators, with whom I live, will be attending also, and he will be able to take over my duties, as his trip is paid for by – get this – a grant. In addition to freeing me of the pesky obligation of traveling abroad, this sudden change in plans will also allow me to be alone on my 34th birthday, when I would have otherwise been in Japan.
Domo Arigato,
Qwanty
This is a brief note I wrote a few months ago:
Dear Federally Funded Grant Group,
I wanted to thank you most whole-heartedly for your understanding and willingness to accommodate me as I enter the final weeks of my pregnancy. Now that I've been advised to engage in some bed rest in order to hinder any possibility of premature delivery, I am grateful that you have offered to give me time off and stop paying me so that I am no longer eligible for the paid maternity leave I would have otherwise been entitled to had I remained employed for a full 20 hours per week prior to giving birth. Also, thank you for the wee multipurpose tool you gave me for Christmas this year. It makes me feel like part of the team, and the way it is printed with the federally funded project name will always make me think of you, Federally Funded Grant Group. I shall carry it on my keychain with pride. Such a practical gift, too – I'm sure the tiny screwdriver will come in handy whenever I feel like I'm getting totally screwed.
The best to you in 2008,
Qwanty
I never did anything with the letter however, as the situation resolved itself. People intervened, and I was placed in a research assistantship that would allow me to work from home as I felt fit – one that I was assured would fund me until my graduation.
Here is a letter I wrote this morning:
Dear Federally Funded Grant Group,
There is nothing one enjoys more than returning from maternity leave to discover that one no longer has a job. Imagine my delight at learning I would be employed with you for only a few more weeks! Thank you for not mentioning this to me until I asked you directly. It turned the discovery of my upcoming unemployed status into a wonderful surprise – the creamy middle of the stale ding dong that is my academic career. Also, kudos to you on your timing! I have already turned down other positions that would have been able to fill this gap. Furthermore, I was just this evening going to purchase a plane ticket to Japan so that I could attend a conference and present a poster. I won't be doing this now, as I can no longer afford it. Fortunately, one of my collaborators, with whom I live, will be attending also, and he will be able to take over my duties, as his trip is paid for by – get this – a grant. In addition to freeing me of the pesky obligation of traveling abroad, this sudden change in plans will also allow me to be alone on my 34th birthday, when I would have otherwise been in Japan.
Domo Arigato,
Qwanty
ahem
originally posted April 19, 2008
Um, hi.
This is so awkward. It's been so long. I feel like such a heel. Here I thought I was all devoted to this notion of writing shite down so that I could later remember it and stuff, but when the going got queasy, the queasy got all Fuck this, I'm taking a nap. And then, when the going got big and round, the big and round got all Jesus, if I have the energy and time to write this down, then I have the energy and time to unfold this blankie and take a nap. And then, when the going got particularly cranky, the particularly cranky got particularly crankier, and then took a nap. And then, after all that napping and cranking, a small person up and came out of – are you sitting down? And not eating? – my VAGINA. Yes! Shot right out of it! And then a month went by, and here we are. Here we are, and I never even took the time to complete the time line I was jabbering about the last time I woke up and shut my bitchy pie hole long enough to write something down. God damn me! I didn't even take the time to document the process I went through as I made the ever important decision as to whether I should eat the placenta! Gaaaaaaahhhh!
So, what's up with you? How is your vagina*? My vagina is fine. Thank you for asking.
I'm not really sure where to begin. So much has happened. My children discovered The Dick Van Dyke Show, which the junior Brain Scientist refers to as 'Vixen Dyke'. I wanna watch Vixen Dyke! Can you blame him? Who doesn't love to watch a little Vixen Dyke? The older girl child attempted to straighten him out on this point, explaining It's not Vixen Dyke. It's Dick Van Dyke. And you shouldn't say 'dick' by itself. She really is a good big sister, isn't she? And she knows what a dick is, it seems. My, she is growing up.
What else has happened? Let's see. Ah, yes. The junior Brain Scientist does not like me anymore. He tells me several times a day: Mama, I don't like you. I suspect it has something to do with the person who came out of – did I mention this? – my VAGINA.
Jesus. I've had approximately one thimble full of beer and I can't think of a damn thing. Why am I even bothering with this?
My apologies.
Perhaps I can try again later.
P.S. – SPOILER ALERT: I didn't eat the placenta.
* Or other favorite orifice.
Um, hi.
This is so awkward. It's been so long. I feel like such a heel. Here I thought I was all devoted to this notion of writing shite down so that I could later remember it and stuff, but when the going got queasy, the queasy got all Fuck this, I'm taking a nap. And then, when the going got big and round, the big and round got all Jesus, if I have the energy and time to write this down, then I have the energy and time to unfold this blankie and take a nap. And then, when the going got particularly cranky, the particularly cranky got particularly crankier, and then took a nap. And then, after all that napping and cranking, a small person up and came out of – are you sitting down? And not eating? – my VAGINA. Yes! Shot right out of it! And then a month went by, and here we are. Here we are, and I never even took the time to complete the time line I was jabbering about the last time I woke up and shut my bitchy pie hole long enough to write something down. God damn me! I didn't even take the time to document the process I went through as I made the ever important decision as to whether I should eat the placenta! Gaaaaaaahhhh!
So, what's up with you? How is your vagina*? My vagina is fine. Thank you for asking.
I'm not really sure where to begin. So much has happened. My children discovered The Dick Van Dyke Show, which the junior Brain Scientist refers to as 'Vixen Dyke'. I wanna watch Vixen Dyke! Can you blame him? Who doesn't love to watch a little Vixen Dyke? The older girl child attempted to straighten him out on this point, explaining It's not Vixen Dyke. It's Dick Van Dyke. And you shouldn't say 'dick' by itself. She really is a good big sister, isn't she? And she knows what a dick is, it seems. My, she is growing up.
What else has happened? Let's see. Ah, yes. The junior Brain Scientist does not like me anymore. He tells me several times a day: Mama, I don't like you. I suspect it has something to do with the person who came out of – did I mention this? – my VAGINA.
Jesus. I've had approximately one thimble full of beer and I can't think of a damn thing. Why am I even bothering with this?
My apologies.
Perhaps I can try again later.
P.S. – SPOILER ALERT: I didn't eat the placenta.
* Or other favorite orifice.
recap, part I
originally posted February 19, 2008
I'm starting to feel that I've been seriously remiss in failing to document any of the on-goings of the past many months. Why have I been so reluctant to create an electronic record of the exciting time I've spent growing a person? The reasons are plentiful:
1) I would not want the other children to someday look on said electronic record and say Hey! Why is it you cared enough to write stuff down for this kid, but all I have is a box of hair wads and free-floating odds and ends and an almost entirely blank baby book and…what? Is that a pork rind? Shaped like a VULVA? You are a horrible mother.
2) While the things that happen during a period of gestation are all-consuming, they aren't really all that interesting. I threw up, and then I bitched some, and then some other stuff happened, and then I was irrational, and then I had to pee a bunch, and suddenly it was eight months later.
3) I will confess – almost every single thing that finds its way to this space is gin-soaked, steeped in wine, mauled by hops, etc. There. I said it. Without the aid of social lubricants, I've not been able to muster the inspiration to fully do justice to the story of the time the Brain Scientist's friend escaped from rehab with Johnny Winter. Yes. Guitarist/albino Johnny Winter. No fucking kidding.
Hmm. I guess the reasons aren't that plentiful. They certainly aren't compelling. That said, I have begun an attempt to make up for lost time by generating a time line covering the exciting events of the pod period. As with nearly all of my undertakings, I am going to kick this one off in typical fashion: with a grand statement of intent, followed by a period of inactivity, followed by a period in which I dick around doing things completely unrelated to the endeavor, followed by regret for suggesting the endeavor in the first place, followed by bitter attempts to get things underway. This should be fun.
I'm starting to feel that I've been seriously remiss in failing to document any of the on-goings of the past many months. Why have I been so reluctant to create an electronic record of the exciting time I've spent growing a person? The reasons are plentiful:
1) I would not want the other children to someday look on said electronic record and say Hey! Why is it you cared enough to write stuff down for this kid, but all I have is a box of hair wads and free-floating odds and ends and an almost entirely blank baby book and…what? Is that a pork rind? Shaped like a VULVA? You are a horrible mother.
2) While the things that happen during a period of gestation are all-consuming, they aren't really all that interesting. I threw up, and then I bitched some, and then some other stuff happened, and then I was irrational, and then I had to pee a bunch, and suddenly it was eight months later.
3) I will confess – almost every single thing that finds its way to this space is gin-soaked, steeped in wine, mauled by hops, etc. There. I said it. Without the aid of social lubricants, I've not been able to muster the inspiration to fully do justice to the story of the time the Brain Scientist's friend escaped from rehab with Johnny Winter. Yes. Guitarist/albino Johnny Winter. No fucking kidding.
Hmm. I guess the reasons aren't that plentiful. They certainly aren't compelling. That said, I have begun an attempt to make up for lost time by generating a time line covering the exciting events of the pod period. As with nearly all of my undertakings, I am going to kick this one off in typical fashion: with a grand statement of intent, followed by a period of inactivity, followed by a period in which I dick around doing things completely unrelated to the endeavor, followed by regret for suggesting the endeavor in the first place, followed by bitter attempts to get things underway. This should be fun.
snippet good
originally posted December 6, 2007
This happened today*:
Lady: Are you having a Christmas baby?
Qwanty: Nope! I'm not due until the end of March!
L: (long silence) My dear, you are having a pony.
Q: Madam! Are you implying I've been fucking a horse?**
* Except for the part that didn't.
** What I actually said was I hear that a lot! This is a lie. I've never had anyone suggest I am with pony.
This happened today*:
Lady: Are you having a Christmas baby?
Qwanty: Nope! I'm not due until the end of March!
L: (long silence) My dear, you are having a pony.
Q: Madam! Are you implying I've been fucking a horse?**
* Except for the part that didn't.
** What I actually said was I hear that a lot! This is a lie. I've never had anyone suggest I am with pony.
from the mouths of babes
originally posted October 8, 2007
I have an eleven-year-old daughter. I know I've mentioned this before, but she doesn't get as much screen time in this blorum because she doesn't see dead people and doesn't throw up on me that often anymore (the last time was almost four years ago, and it was just as I was leaving the house to go out to a department related dinner, and it was primarily up the sleeve of my favorite jacket – the vomit, that is, not the dead people. She just doesn't seem to see the ghosties). She is a delight, however, this daughter – and not just because of the absence of ghost sightings and projectile vomit. These things can be charming as well, under the proper circumstances.
This daughter – whom I shall refer to for the moment as The Qw-"iter", pronounced "quite-er", as she is half Qwanty, half "writer" – says all sorts of things that I never expected to spring from the mouth of someone who sprang from my loins. I like to write these things down, so that I can later reflect on them, string them together to derive some larger meaning, and marvel over what a wee, insightful wonder she is.
Take for example the following:
Oh great. It's a fountain of blood.
Spoken without an ounce of terror, this came about while we were in the kitchen. I was confused, because I couldn't see the fountain of blood, and for a moment I feared she had gone the way of her younger brother and was seeing dead ancient peoples and their dead ancient people garden focal points. Fortunately, this fountain of blood was in the computer game she was playing. Now, taken alone this comment doesn't seem particularly insightful, but just hold the fuck on, you.
Here is another:
You know how sometimes you're eating a Slim Jim, and you swallow it, but there's still something left in your mouth, and it doesn't taste like anything?
Ah yes. The lingering, flavorless mystery that is the chewy memory of the once snappy Slim Jim. I don't think she ultimately went anywhere with this one. As I recall, I told her that I did indeed know what she was talking about, and this was enough for her, and she returned to doing battle around a computerized fountain of blood, satisfied that I too had tasted the ghost of the Slim Jim.
Some time ago, in a somewhat devastating moment for me, she said this:
YOU know who Johnny Depp is?
Yes, can you believe it? ME? Ancient, thirty-three year old ME? And I said to her, YOU know who Johnny Depp is? We stared at each other in a moment of shared disbelief, and then went uncomfortably about our respective business.
***
What's the point of all this? What do these comments mean? Well, for one, they suggest that I am negligent in that I let my daughter eat sticks of "meat". Beyond that, these comments taken together describe the experience of graduate school. If you were to have asked me a month ago to describe what graduate school is like, I might have gaped open-mouthed at you, blinked rapidly, teared up, made a few low, guttural sounds, and ran away to hide in a closet. Ask me now, and I would tell you this:
It's like sitting by a fountain eating a Slim Jim.
One day, you're sitting next to a beautiful fountain, dipping your toes in its cool, misty loveliness, tossing your pennies in and making marvelous wishes, savoring the day and eating – nay, snapping into – a Slim Jim. It's a fine Slim Jim, and it is indeed snappy and zesty and meatish – all the things a Slim Jim should be. All is well. Then, as a few drops of water from the magnificent fountain fall into your mouth, you suddenly realize that the water is saltier than it should be, and that it isn't just the Slim Jim talking. No, there's something WRONG with this water. And then slowly it dawns on you that this isn't a fountain of water, it's a fountain of BLOOD, and you try to scream this thought – Oh great. It's a fountain of blood – but there's something in your mouth and you can't make the words come out! It's Slim Jim, but it doesn't taste like ANYTHING, and there's just so much of it! What's worse, as you're sitting there, flailing about, spattered with blood, gagging on flavorless Slim Jim remnants, some youngun comes by and expresses total disbelief that you could possibly know who Johnny Depp is, and suddenly you feel so old – so very, very old. Then, just when you think things can't get any worse, a woman in shoulder pads dashes by, pausing only to kick you swiftly in the crotch and give you 10,000 Slim Jims that you must eat in a timely fashion.
You lay on the ground, splattered with gore, your mouth full of something that tastes like nothing, clutching your crotch and wondering where the time has gone, eyeing the 10,000 Slim Jims with disgust and trying to remember why you ever thought any of this was a good idea in the first place. Then, as the tears fill your eyes and you reach for Slim Jim number 1, Shoulder Pads comes back and tells you you're doing a great job.
And that's what graduate school is like!
I have an eleven-year-old daughter. I know I've mentioned this before, but she doesn't get as much screen time in this blorum because she doesn't see dead people and doesn't throw up on me that often anymore (the last time was almost four years ago, and it was just as I was leaving the house to go out to a department related dinner, and it was primarily up the sleeve of my favorite jacket – the vomit, that is, not the dead people. She just doesn't seem to see the ghosties). She is a delight, however, this daughter – and not just because of the absence of ghost sightings and projectile vomit. These things can be charming as well, under the proper circumstances.
This daughter – whom I shall refer to for the moment as The Qw-"iter", pronounced "quite-er", as she is half Qwanty, half "writer" – says all sorts of things that I never expected to spring from the mouth of someone who sprang from my loins. I like to write these things down, so that I can later reflect on them, string them together to derive some larger meaning, and marvel over what a wee, insightful wonder she is.
Take for example the following:
Oh great. It's a fountain of blood.
Spoken without an ounce of terror, this came about while we were in the kitchen. I was confused, because I couldn't see the fountain of blood, and for a moment I feared she had gone the way of her younger brother and was seeing dead ancient peoples and their dead ancient people garden focal points. Fortunately, this fountain of blood was in the computer game she was playing. Now, taken alone this comment doesn't seem particularly insightful, but just hold the fuck on, you.
Here is another:
You know how sometimes you're eating a Slim Jim, and you swallow it, but there's still something left in your mouth, and it doesn't taste like anything?
Ah yes. The lingering, flavorless mystery that is the chewy memory of the once snappy Slim Jim. I don't think she ultimately went anywhere with this one. As I recall, I told her that I did indeed know what she was talking about, and this was enough for her, and she returned to doing battle around a computerized fountain of blood, satisfied that I too had tasted the ghost of the Slim Jim.
Some time ago, in a somewhat devastating moment for me, she said this:
YOU know who Johnny Depp is?
Yes, can you believe it? ME? Ancient, thirty-three year old ME? And I said to her, YOU know who Johnny Depp is? We stared at each other in a moment of shared disbelief, and then went uncomfortably about our respective business.
***
What's the point of all this? What do these comments mean? Well, for one, they suggest that I am negligent in that I let my daughter eat sticks of "meat". Beyond that, these comments taken together describe the experience of graduate school. If you were to have asked me a month ago to describe what graduate school is like, I might have gaped open-mouthed at you, blinked rapidly, teared up, made a few low, guttural sounds, and ran away to hide in a closet. Ask me now, and I would tell you this:
It's like sitting by a fountain eating a Slim Jim.
One day, you're sitting next to a beautiful fountain, dipping your toes in its cool, misty loveliness, tossing your pennies in and making marvelous wishes, savoring the day and eating – nay, snapping into – a Slim Jim. It's a fine Slim Jim, and it is indeed snappy and zesty and meatish – all the things a Slim Jim should be. All is well. Then, as a few drops of water from the magnificent fountain fall into your mouth, you suddenly realize that the water is saltier than it should be, and that it isn't just the Slim Jim talking. No, there's something WRONG with this water. And then slowly it dawns on you that this isn't a fountain of water, it's a fountain of BLOOD, and you try to scream this thought – Oh great. It's a fountain of blood – but there's something in your mouth and you can't make the words come out! It's Slim Jim, but it doesn't taste like ANYTHING, and there's just so much of it! What's worse, as you're sitting there, flailing about, spattered with blood, gagging on flavorless Slim Jim remnants, some youngun comes by and expresses total disbelief that you could possibly know who Johnny Depp is, and suddenly you feel so old – so very, very old. Then, just when you think things can't get any worse, a woman in shoulder pads dashes by, pausing only to kick you swiftly in the crotch and give you 10,000 Slim Jims that you must eat in a timely fashion.
You lay on the ground, splattered with gore, your mouth full of something that tastes like nothing, clutching your crotch and wondering where the time has gone, eyeing the 10,000 Slim Jims with disgust and trying to remember why you ever thought any of this was a good idea in the first place. Then, as the tears fill your eyes and you reach for Slim Jim number 1, Shoulder Pads comes back and tells you you're doing a great job.
And that's what graduate school is like!
a few things i’d like to mention, in case we get sucked into the television or something
originally posted August 22, 2007
The day after I posted the Podcast in which I acknowledged that I am with Brain Scientist, I received an email from the head of my program that began with the ominous statement I know that you are pregnant. The message was designed to convey encouragement, but it included an overt reference to her death and a somewhat veiled reference to my own. Although I don't really think she obtained the pregnancy information from this qwanty space, I am a paranoid sort, and so must state the following: I say many things in jest. Please note that I claim to be living under the Devil's scrotum in order to maintain anonymity. Do not hold any of this against me. That said, I would also like to offer the following insight: If you are composing a note of encouragement, be sure to omit any references to the author's or recipient's death, as this tends to overshadow the encouraging aspect, leaving all involved with an ooky feeling.
***
The other day, I was fortunate enough to miss this exchange between Brain Scientists senior and junior:
Scene: The pool, dusk.
BS, Jr.: Who is that?
BS, Sr.: Where?
BS, Jr.: (pointing towards deep end of pool): There.
BS, Sr.: (in hopeful tone) Those are trees?
BS, Jr.: No, not trees. Them. The scary guys.
BS, Sr.: Where are they?
BS, Jr.: (pointing to the bottom of the deep end of the pool) There.
BS, Sr.: What do they look like?
BS, Jr.: Museum guys!
(Cue Twilight Zone theme.)
Do you know what guys are at the museum? Hohokam guys, in a display of Hohokam Indians that BS, Jr. refuses to approach because he is afraid of it. Do you whose ancient village archaeologists are unearthing a half block away from our house? Hohokam guys'. Do you know whose ancient ruins our house is built upon? Hohokam guys'. And now, to bring this full circle, do you know who the junior Brain Scientist thought he saw hanging around in the bottom of our pool? Hohokam guys. I'm hoping he was mistaken, and that it was an early eighties Adam Ant and a Village Person or something.
In any case, if that doesn't motivate one to finish one's dissertation and move elsewhere, I don't know what will.
***
Finally, on a lighter note. Did you know that if you throw a samosa from Dehli Palace down on a plate in a huff while arguing with a Brain Scientist, it will explode like a flaky water balloon filled with potatoes and peas, covering you and all that surrounds you with its savory shrapnel? Well, it will. Please exercise caution when trying to emphasize a point with a samosa.
The day after I posted the Podcast in which I acknowledged that I am with Brain Scientist, I received an email from the head of my program that began with the ominous statement I know that you are pregnant. The message was designed to convey encouragement, but it included an overt reference to her death and a somewhat veiled reference to my own. Although I don't really think she obtained the pregnancy information from this qwanty space, I am a paranoid sort, and so must state the following: I say many things in jest. Please note that I claim to be living under the Devil's scrotum in order to maintain anonymity. Do not hold any of this against me. That said, I would also like to offer the following insight: If you are composing a note of encouragement, be sure to omit any references to the author's or recipient's death, as this tends to overshadow the encouraging aspect, leaving all involved with an ooky feeling.
***
The other day, I was fortunate enough to miss this exchange between Brain Scientists senior and junior:
Scene: The pool, dusk.
BS, Jr.: Who is that?
BS, Sr.: Where?
BS, Jr.: (pointing towards deep end of pool): There.
BS, Sr.: (in hopeful tone) Those are trees?
BS, Jr.: No, not trees. Them. The scary guys.
BS, Sr.: Where are they?
BS, Jr.: (pointing to the bottom of the deep end of the pool) There.
BS, Sr.: What do they look like?
BS, Jr.: Museum guys!
(Cue Twilight Zone theme.)
Do you know what guys are at the museum? Hohokam guys, in a display of Hohokam Indians that BS, Jr. refuses to approach because he is afraid of it. Do you whose ancient village archaeologists are unearthing a half block away from our house? Hohokam guys'. Do you know whose ancient ruins our house is built upon? Hohokam guys'. And now, to bring this full circle, do you know who the junior Brain Scientist thought he saw hanging around in the bottom of our pool? Hohokam guys. I'm hoping he was mistaken, and that it was an early eighties Adam Ant and a Village Person or something.
In any case, if that doesn't motivate one to finish one's dissertation and move elsewhere, I don't know what will.
***
Finally, on a lighter note. Did you know that if you throw a samosa from Dehli Palace down on a plate in a huff while arguing with a Brain Scientist, it will explode like a flaky water balloon filled with potatoes and peas, covering you and all that surrounds you with its savory shrapnel? Well, it will. Please exercise caution when trying to emphasize a point with a samosa.
podcast
originally posted August 8, 2007
Last whatever, Cognosco and Forget-Me-Now and BS and I went to see Zappa Plays Zappa, which was great fun. Dweezil was wearing funny pants, as you might have expected. And clever us, while we paid for admission for four, we managed to sneak in a fifth, hidden somewhere in the vicinity of Cog's lady pocket (that's the one they usually don't search). Later this week we are going to see Zappa Plays Zappa again, and I am hoping most wholeheartedly that Dweezil will again be wearing funny pants. And clever us, while we paid for admission for four, once again we shall be sneaking in a fifth.
***
My days are an unending cycle of crackers, pickles, grapefruit soda, and ginger beer. I am queasy. I am no fun. I am a pod. While I would ordinarily refrain from sharing this information at this point in the pod period, it has become visibly apparent to people I don't even know, so I might as well embrace the whole pseudo-scientist thing and act like I'm not superstitious and just cop to the fact that I am incubating the next incarnation of Brain Scientist (or Brain Scientists, as an opinionated few asserted today) and quit trying to omit any overt references to this fact. I asked the BS if he thought it was necessary for me to avoid mentioning any of this here so that I might have a better chance of safeguarding things, and he asked me if I would like to go visit a moon doctor and have a handful of crystals thrown at my bosom. I'm not exactly sure what that would accomplish. I think he might have said this to point out that I'm being silly. I guess if something goes awry and I am left without future BS, I'll have to explain to those I see daily why I'm not so misshapen anymore anyway. Plus, were this to happen, I'd probably grumble about it in this here blorum, and this way I'll be spared having to type a long-winded prologue in which I explain the whole pod period that I failed to mention for fear of uterine retribution. So there. I said it. Sort of. I hope this doesn't make me negligent in the eyes of the powers that control my uterus. Or, as these powers might say, 'pregligent'. The powers that control my uterus are big on puns.
Last whatever, Cognosco and Forget-Me-Now and BS and I went to see Zappa Plays Zappa, which was great fun. Dweezil was wearing funny pants, as you might have expected. And clever us, while we paid for admission for four, we managed to sneak in a fifth, hidden somewhere in the vicinity of Cog's lady pocket (that's the one they usually don't search). Later this week we are going to see Zappa Plays Zappa again, and I am hoping most wholeheartedly that Dweezil will again be wearing funny pants. And clever us, while we paid for admission for four, once again we shall be sneaking in a fifth.
***
My days are an unending cycle of crackers, pickles, grapefruit soda, and ginger beer. I am queasy. I am no fun. I am a pod. While I would ordinarily refrain from sharing this information at this point in the pod period, it has become visibly apparent to people I don't even know, so I might as well embrace the whole pseudo-scientist thing and act like I'm not superstitious and just cop to the fact that I am incubating the next incarnation of Brain Scientist (or Brain Scientists, as an opinionated few asserted today) and quit trying to omit any overt references to this fact. I asked the BS if he thought it was necessary for me to avoid mentioning any of this here so that I might have a better chance of safeguarding things, and he asked me if I would like to go visit a moon doctor and have a handful of crystals thrown at my bosom. I'm not exactly sure what that would accomplish. I think he might have said this to point out that I'm being silly. I guess if something goes awry and I am left without future BS, I'll have to explain to those I see daily why I'm not so misshapen anymore anyway. Plus, were this to happen, I'd probably grumble about it in this here blorum, and this way I'll be spared having to type a long-winded prologue in which I explain the whole pod period that I failed to mention for fear of uterine retribution. So there. I said it. Sort of. I hope this doesn't make me negligent in the eyes of the powers that control my uterus. Or, as these powers might say, 'pregligent'. The powers that control my uterus are big on puns.
Sunday, September 14, 2008
salty balls, held for only the slightest of pleasure
originally posted August 8, 2007
I went to a Statistician's Ball. Well, not really a ball. It was more of a workshop. A workshop led by a man named Hadley. Hadley was from New Zealand, and had a pierced eyebrow with one of those bar things through it. I wasn't expecting this sort of thing from a statistician. I mean, I don't even know what to call the thing that was in his eyebrow, and I like to think of myself as one of your cooler statistical sorts. Note, though, that I do not refer to myself as a statistician. People who do what I do and call themselves statisticians are big posers (or poseurs if you prefer, you big wanker) and should not be trusted with your data. That said, I'm not sure what to call the bar in his eyebrow. If you know, keep it to yourself, you hipster assface.
The workshop was co-led by a woman called Di, who may have also been from New Zealand, and seemed to also be a statistician, although it was clear she was the type that is not particularly proficient with numbers, because when lunch time rolled around she ordered two pizzas to feed eleven people (or 11.1, give or take), most of whom were men and one of whom was German. Maybe it's just that she's not good with things that approximate parties, especially the type that are profoundly lame. In any case, I was hungry.
The Statistician's Ball kicked off on Saturday morning with a rendezvous at the Little America Hotel in Salt Lake City, Utah. For those of you not in the know, this is the hotel that the cast of High School Musical stayed at when filming High School Musical. I won't even bother explaining what this is, but it elicited a starstuck Ooooooh from my ten-year-old daughter when I mentioned it, and she requested a picture of it, because THAT IS WHERE THE CAST OF HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL SLEPT, and we for some reason care about this.
Upon arriving at the hotel, we were met by the others, a colorful assortment of people eager to maul their statistical wangs, most (or all) of whom were not even aware that they were SITTING IN THE LOBBY OF THE HOTEL WHERE THE CAST OF HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL SLEPT. Before long we were herded into a large black vehicle that was to provide our 'VIP Transportation' to the Workshop locale. This was fun, because it was a big, snazzy, black SUV that made it seem like we were an entourage or a posse or someone's peeps or something, instead of a group of people off to explore the quimtastic world of dynamic regression plots.
Once we were dropped off at the building in which the workshop was to be held and the driver had departed, it became clear that we were not in the right place. We were looking for a facility with computers and such, but all that could be found were offices that were gutted and empty, and one office that housed a title company. Hadley and Di were baffled, and expressed so in charming accents. The rest of us were baffled, too, and expressed so in less charming accents. The address matched the address Hadley had. What the devil was going on? Hadley and some of the more motivated others rode the elevators up and down the three floors of the building, looking for something that might be the facility they'd reserved for us. When nothing resembling this was found, the geekiest among us whipped out ePhones and iThings and locating devices and such, and stood about trying to figure out where the fuck we were (Salt Lake City, U-Should-Have-Double-Checked-The-Fucking-Location-Tah), and where the fuck we ought to be (Salt Lake City, U-Have-No-Fucking-Clue-Tah). I took part in none of this, opting instead to subtly fashion a Hadley effigy out of an aspirin bottle and some trail mix, so that I might have a means of inflicting a wee bit of pain on him for not bothering to check out the facility the day before. I abandoned this effort in favor of a Di effigy made out of a tampon and some lint after she merrily made the suggestion that we troop down the street to a Starbucks she saw and conduct our eight hour workshop there. Great idea.
As it turned out, three of the attendees had shown up on their own and thus had cars with them, and one of the attendees had a place of employment on the other side of town. We piled into the cars, formed a pitiful, directionally challenged caravan, and made our way to a pharmaceutical company in the middle of nowhere. Great geekery ensued. I almost threw a handful of raisins at the time-wasting, question-asking, more-than-his-share-of-pizza-eating blowhard across the table from me. Some of us were hungry. At least one of us was queasy. We all learned a little something.
Oh, how I love balls.
I mean workshops.
I went to a Statistician's Ball. Well, not really a ball. It was more of a workshop. A workshop led by a man named Hadley. Hadley was from New Zealand, and had a pierced eyebrow with one of those bar things through it. I wasn't expecting this sort of thing from a statistician. I mean, I don't even know what to call the thing that was in his eyebrow, and I like to think of myself as one of your cooler statistical sorts. Note, though, that I do not refer to myself as a statistician. People who do what I do and call themselves statisticians are big posers (or poseurs if you prefer, you big wanker) and should not be trusted with your data. That said, I'm not sure what to call the bar in his eyebrow. If you know, keep it to yourself, you hipster assface.
The workshop was co-led by a woman called Di, who may have also been from New Zealand, and seemed to also be a statistician, although it was clear she was the type that is not particularly proficient with numbers, because when lunch time rolled around she ordered two pizzas to feed eleven people (or 11.1, give or take), most of whom were men and one of whom was German. Maybe it's just that she's not good with things that approximate parties, especially the type that are profoundly lame. In any case, I was hungry.
The Statistician's Ball kicked off on Saturday morning with a rendezvous at the Little America Hotel in Salt Lake City, Utah. For those of you not in the know, this is the hotel that the cast of High School Musical stayed at when filming High School Musical. I won't even bother explaining what this is, but it elicited a starstuck Ooooooh from my ten-year-old daughter when I mentioned it, and she requested a picture of it, because THAT IS WHERE THE CAST OF HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL SLEPT, and we for some reason care about this.
Upon arriving at the hotel, we were met by the others, a colorful assortment of people eager to maul their statistical wangs, most (or all) of whom were not even aware that they were SITTING IN THE LOBBY OF THE HOTEL WHERE THE CAST OF HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL SLEPT. Before long we were herded into a large black vehicle that was to provide our 'VIP Transportation' to the Workshop locale. This was fun, because it was a big, snazzy, black SUV that made it seem like we were an entourage or a posse or someone's peeps or something, instead of a group of people off to explore the quimtastic world of dynamic regression plots.
Once we were dropped off at the building in which the workshop was to be held and the driver had departed, it became clear that we were not in the right place. We were looking for a facility with computers and such, but all that could be found were offices that were gutted and empty, and one office that housed a title company. Hadley and Di were baffled, and expressed so in charming accents. The rest of us were baffled, too, and expressed so in less charming accents. The address matched the address Hadley had. What the devil was going on? Hadley and some of the more motivated others rode the elevators up and down the three floors of the building, looking for something that might be the facility they'd reserved for us. When nothing resembling this was found, the geekiest among us whipped out ePhones and iThings and locating devices and such, and stood about trying to figure out where the fuck we were (Salt Lake City, U-Should-Have-Double-Checked-The-Fucking-Location-Tah), and where the fuck we ought to be (Salt Lake City, U-Have-No-Fucking-Clue-Tah). I took part in none of this, opting instead to subtly fashion a Hadley effigy out of an aspirin bottle and some trail mix, so that I might have a means of inflicting a wee bit of pain on him for not bothering to check out the facility the day before. I abandoned this effort in favor of a Di effigy made out of a tampon and some lint after she merrily made the suggestion that we troop down the street to a Starbucks she saw and conduct our eight hour workshop there. Great idea.
As it turned out, three of the attendees had shown up on their own and thus had cars with them, and one of the attendees had a place of employment on the other side of town. We piled into the cars, formed a pitiful, directionally challenged caravan, and made our way to a pharmaceutical company in the middle of nowhere. Great geekery ensued. I almost threw a handful of raisins at the time-wasting, question-asking, more-than-his-share-of-pizza-eating blowhard across the table from me. Some of us were hungry. At least one of us was queasy. We all learned a little something.
Oh, how I love balls.
I mean workshops.
tiny terror
originally posted July 20, 2007
Last night at dinner, BS, Jr. pointed to the floor and said very, very solemnly, I saw mama die on the floor. Mama died in the street.
Great. That's comforting to hear from a ghost-seeing, two-year-old brainiac.
Now I must return to the safety of my closet.
Last night at dinner, BS, Jr. pointed to the floor and said very, very solemnly, I saw mama die on the floor. Mama died in the street.
Great. That's comforting to hear from a ghost-seeing, two-year-old brainiac.
Now I must return to the safety of my closet.
heaven knows he's miserable now
originally posted July 7, 2007
The TCB is back to barking and fevering, as I should have expected. The fever has only been kept at bay by various elixirs and such, and the barking seems to subside during the day, only to return at night when his little head is as close to your ear as it can possibly get, because he is bogarting your pillow. To help with this problem, I sat with him in the bathroom at four in the morning, hot shower running, savoring the steam. When we returned to bed he was very much awake, and launched into many, many loud rounds of a popular child's song, as re-styled by Morrissey and performed by Harvey Fierstein:
If you're happy and you know it, go away.
(Repeat 100 times).
Awww. He wears black on the outside, 'cause black is how he feels on the inside. Poor Mini Moz.
The TCB is back to barking and fevering, as I should have expected. The fever has only been kept at bay by various elixirs and such, and the barking seems to subside during the day, only to return at night when his little head is as close to your ear as it can possibly get, because he is bogarting your pillow. To help with this problem, I sat with him in the bathroom at four in the morning, hot shower running, savoring the steam. When we returned to bed he was very much awake, and launched into many, many loud rounds of a popular child's song, as re-styled by Morrissey and performed by Harvey Fierstein:
If you're happy and you know it, go away.
(Repeat 100 times).
Awww. He wears black on the outside, 'cause black is how he feels on the inside. Poor Mini Moz.
a cautionary tale of absolute tr-oof
originally posted July 6, 2007
There are really nothing but downsides associated with feeding your child a food that is a novel color not normally associated with that food. I can't really think of all of these downsides now, but I also can't think of any upsides. My point is this – if you give your child gatorade that is electric blue in color, you are eventually going to encounter that gatorade again in one form or another, and you will most likely be surprised. Because you know what'll give you a startle? Bright blue oof.* And it will take you a moment to process why the oof is at all blue, because you will have forgotten about giving the child the gatorade, and your experience will instead be one of absolute horror: OH MY GOD, WHAT IN HOLY…Until you remember. Oh yeah. Blue gatorade…
I had the most horrifying moment of inappropriately colored food related confusion yesterday. The little BS woke up in the morning with a smidge of a fever and the slightest congestion, and by the afternoon the fever was down to practically nothing. However, when he woke up from his nap, he was 103 degrees, struggling to breathe, and barking like a seal. By the time I was on the phone with the nurse he was 104, and by the time we arrived at the emergency room around the corner he was 105. It was pretty quick, this fever. I should mention that this last temperature was taken rectally, a process that the BS, Jr. seemed to regard as absolute bull oof. Anyway, there the little guy was, flopped over my lap, barking and screaming and crying and having a thermometer poked in his hiney, when suddenly he threw up all over me – vast, vast quantities of bright red glop. Everyone in the room was quite alarmed over this development, particularly me: OH MY GOD, WHAT IN HOLY... Until I remembered. Oh yeah. Red velvet cake… And then we all had a tiny chuckle, the medical professionals and our party, once we figured out it wasn't blood that was spewing forth from his wee, wailing mouth, but rather festively tinted Fourth of July cake.
The diagnosis? Croup. Some mist through a nebulizer, a shot of steroids, and today the Tiny Curly Banshee is running around, free of fever and barks, talking like Harvey Fierstein.
Phew.
***
* Oof: (üf), noun, verb. The word once used by my young daughter to refer to all things scatalogical, e.g. Mama, hava oof, or Look mama! Oof! or I oof! Still sometimes used by mama to convey disbelief, e.g., Dude, you are full of oof.
There are really nothing but downsides associated with feeding your child a food that is a novel color not normally associated with that food. I can't really think of all of these downsides now, but I also can't think of any upsides. My point is this – if you give your child gatorade that is electric blue in color, you are eventually going to encounter that gatorade again in one form or another, and you will most likely be surprised. Because you know what'll give you a startle? Bright blue oof.* And it will take you a moment to process why the oof is at all blue, because you will have forgotten about giving the child the gatorade, and your experience will instead be one of absolute horror: OH MY GOD, WHAT IN HOLY…Until you remember. Oh yeah. Blue gatorade…
I had the most horrifying moment of inappropriately colored food related confusion yesterday. The little BS woke up in the morning with a smidge of a fever and the slightest congestion, and by the afternoon the fever was down to practically nothing. However, when he woke up from his nap, he was 103 degrees, struggling to breathe, and barking like a seal. By the time I was on the phone with the nurse he was 104, and by the time we arrived at the emergency room around the corner he was 105. It was pretty quick, this fever. I should mention that this last temperature was taken rectally, a process that the BS, Jr. seemed to regard as absolute bull oof. Anyway, there the little guy was, flopped over my lap, barking and screaming and crying and having a thermometer poked in his hiney, when suddenly he threw up all over me – vast, vast quantities of bright red glop. Everyone in the room was quite alarmed over this development, particularly me: OH MY GOD, WHAT IN HOLY... Until I remembered. Oh yeah. Red velvet cake… And then we all had a tiny chuckle, the medical professionals and our party, once we figured out it wasn't blood that was spewing forth from his wee, wailing mouth, but rather festively tinted Fourth of July cake.
The diagnosis? Croup. Some mist through a nebulizer, a shot of steroids, and today the Tiny Curly Banshee is running around, free of fever and barks, talking like Harvey Fierstein.
Phew.
***
* Oof: (üf), noun, verb. The word once used by my young daughter to refer to all things scatalogical, e.g. Mama, hava oof, or Look mama! Oof! or I oof! Still sometimes used by mama to convey disbelief, e.g., Dude, you are full of oof.
cog tease
originally posted July 2, 2007
And now, a little sumpin' for Cognosco:
Setting: In the car, listening to the radio.
BS: Who the hell is this? Is this Kiss?
Q: Hmm. If it is Kiss, Kiss wasn't very good.
BS: No. Kiss wasn't very good. But they weren't this bad.
Q: Yeah. This is really bad.
BS: Yeah. This must be Poison.
(Horrible music continues.)
Radio Guy: And that was Poison!
Q: Good call!
BS: Yeah! Hey! We should call Cognosco right now and tell her she sucks!*
(Hooting laughter ensues. Attempts made to high five.)
***
* Note to Cognosco: You do not actually suck. We shouldn't even talk. In fact, we can't even talk, as I am too busy humming Eddie Money, and the BS is still singing Spam Pygmalion.
And now, a little sumpin' for Cognosco:
Setting: In the car, listening to the radio.
BS: Who the hell is this? Is this Kiss?
Q: Hmm. If it is Kiss, Kiss wasn't very good.
BS: No. Kiss wasn't very good. But they weren't this bad.
Q: Yeah. This is really bad.
BS: Yeah. This must be Poison.
(Horrible music continues.)
Radio Guy: And that was Poison!
Q: Good call!
BS: Yeah! Hey! We should call Cognosco right now and tell her she sucks!*
(Hooting laughter ensues. Attempts made to high five.)
***
* Note to Cognosco: You do not actually suck. We shouldn't even talk. In fact, we can't even talk, as I am too busy humming Eddie Money, and the BS is still singing Spam Pygmalion.
cock tease
originally posted July 2, 2007
I have a long history of being infatuated with teachers. There was that substitute teacher when I was in the third grade, the one who subbed for us for, like, three weeks. It was a particularly exciting period of substitute teaching, as it was cloaked in the mystery of why we needed a substitute for so long. It wasn't vacation related – where the h-e-double hockey sticks was Mrs. McMenimen, anyway? I don't remember the name of the sub, but recall that I thought he was really handsome, and I would imagine greeting him after work and kissing him at the foot of our green shag carpeted stairs. I now would probably disagree with my eight-year-old self as to the magnitude of his hotness, just as I would over the issues of the attractiveness of Ponch, Fonzie, Michael Knight, and -- I can barely tell you this -- Potsie. I would also take issue with my choice of carpet – for fuck's sake, it was 1982. Why shag? Perhaps my young brain already had a sense of what that word would come to mean to me…
One of my big teacher crushes came in high school. I fancied the photography teacher. This is not because he was hot. We should probably just get this out of the way right now: While it is true that I enjoy men who are attractive, it is also true that I have been known to enjoy men who are ridiculous. Mind you, it doesn't have to be any particular brand of ridiculous, just as long as I can really sink my teeth into it. For example, prior incarnations of the ridiculous have included a penchant for flouncy shirts and velveteen pants, reams of terrible horrible no good very bad prose, and the decision to adopt the stage name 'Flay'. I cannot tell you the number of times Kristin has muttered the words, That guy goes beyond ridiculous. That guy is ricockulous. RI-COCK-U-LOUS. Yes, it is true -- I loves the ricockulous.
Anyhoo, back to Mr. Photo. I'm not quite sure what his particular ricockulosity was. He was Jewish, and had a big mess of curly hair, and was an old hippie. He told me I should date his son. He suggested colleges I should attend, the ones where "all the flaming weirdos" went. I took this as a compliment. He told me about seeing the Doors perform when he and his wife were young, and demonstrated, alone with me in the classroom, how Jim Morrison held the microphone and moved when he sang Light My Fire. It's coming together, isn't it? Kind of ricockulous. What's even more ricockulous is the way I would listen to Abba sing When I Kissed the Teacher, after school, alone in my room. I would dance about, flapping my arms in the way you do when you dance to this song (Come on. Listen to it. Are you flapping? You aren't? You have no soul, zombie thing.) I would sing along, and modify the words to suit my situation: He was leaning over me, trying to explain the laws of Pho-tog-ra-PHEEEEEEEEE… It was a disgraceful display.
One day just before graduation, a couple of days after my eighteenth birthday, I was alone in the classroom with him and my friend Angela. Pulling me on his lap he said, Now that you're eighteen, I guess that means you can sit on my lap. This I was not prepared for. I think I laughed and sort of scooted away or something. It was that unexpected and horrifying and ABSOLUTELY RICOCKULOUS. I mean, WHAT? Where did this come from? It was all so awkward and strange and inappropriate and not in the damn Abba song. Lap sitting? Me? Huh? And what about the underaged Angela, off there to the side, doing something photography related and looking sort of wide eyed and confused? I was NOT, as Abba put it, "in the seventh heaven".
Many years later I went to see the movie American Beauty with my then husband, a "writer" of sorts (and way beyond ricockulous, and not in a good way, as though you needed to ask.) Anyway, there I was, at a movie about a guy who is hot for a high school girl, between the "writer" and a stranger who was truly enjoying the movie. This stranger was clapping and hooting and really relating to the whole thing, like the way you did when you saw Say Anything or Blue Velvet or whatever. I spent the whole movie being kind of ooked out, what between the content of the movie and all the pervy kindred spirit action going on beside me between this man and the giant Spacey on the screen.
When the lights came up I turned to get a look at the creep next to me (that is, the one I was not married to), and saw that it was Mr. Photo who I was sitting beside. Then Mr. P turned to me, and saw that it was I who sat beside him. Talk about awkward. We stared at each other kind of wide-eyed for a moment. I would like to tell you that I said something dry and witty, a la a drunk Winston Churchill, but I did not. Instead I turned and fled. Well played, Qwanty.
***
There were other teachers on whom I have crushed, but no teacher crush has ever been as important as the one I have now. Additionally, I think I've perhaps finally moved away from the ricockulous. This teacher is a Brain Scientist. You would like him. He recently had this exchange with our small child:
BS, to no one in particular: Wow, Keith Richards really looks like a corpse.
BS, Jr.: I wannarida horse!
BS: There is no horse. I said corpse.
BS, Jr.: I wannarida corpse!
BS: No you don't want to ride a corpse, because it is a corpse, and it is Keith Richards, and it is alive.
Charming, no? And not really too ricockulous. Perhaps a bit irresponsible though – I mean, no two-year-old should be looking at a picture of Keith Richards.
As I've mentioned before, the Brain Scientist likes bone marrow, and might advise you to eat some, and will happily give you a lengthy, evolutionary explanation as to why, and you just try and shut him up. Mmmm. Marrowy. Mmmm. Long winded explanations of marrowy. Huh. Perhaps this might be construed as the teensiest bit ricockulous.
The other day the Brain Scientist mentioned, in a very off-handed and entirely serious way, that he would like to start a ninja college. He went on to explain what he meant, and it was not nearly as ricockulous as you might be thinking. I won't share the details, because I think they might be a secret. I will tell you this: it involves more than merely tiptoeing from class to class in pajamas. Perhaps this is not making the case for my move away from ricockularity.
The Brain Scientist has been in many bands, too, one of which had a song called Fuck in a Pile of Bees. And it was a good song! It takes a certain kind of man to pull that off – one who is perhaps a tad ricockulous, but who nonetheless has a certain panache that is not based entirely in the R. Really. I mean it. Oh, wait. I have just questioned him about this song, and I have been informed that the formal title is in fact Erototrauma (Fuck in a Pile of Bees). I stand corrected.
Speaking of songs, the Brain Scientist serenades me quite often with songs he's been involved in. In fact, this happened just now, in the form of an exuberant verse from Spam Pygmalion.
And I quote:
Spam Pygmalion! Spam Pygmalion! Quiver in the gel of your unnatural birth!
Hmmm.
Well now.
I guess some things never change.
Jesus. Do I loves the ricockulous.
I have a long history of being infatuated with teachers. There was that substitute teacher when I was in the third grade, the one who subbed for us for, like, three weeks. It was a particularly exciting period of substitute teaching, as it was cloaked in the mystery of why we needed a substitute for so long. It wasn't vacation related – where the h-e-double hockey sticks was Mrs. McMenimen, anyway? I don't remember the name of the sub, but recall that I thought he was really handsome, and I would imagine greeting him after work and kissing him at the foot of our green shag carpeted stairs. I now would probably disagree with my eight-year-old self as to the magnitude of his hotness, just as I would over the issues of the attractiveness of Ponch, Fonzie, Michael Knight, and -- I can barely tell you this -- Potsie. I would also take issue with my choice of carpet – for fuck's sake, it was 1982. Why shag? Perhaps my young brain already had a sense of what that word would come to mean to me…
One of my big teacher crushes came in high school. I fancied the photography teacher. This is not because he was hot. We should probably just get this out of the way right now: While it is true that I enjoy men who are attractive, it is also true that I have been known to enjoy men who are ridiculous. Mind you, it doesn't have to be any particular brand of ridiculous, just as long as I can really sink my teeth into it. For example, prior incarnations of the ridiculous have included a penchant for flouncy shirts and velveteen pants, reams of terrible horrible no good very bad prose, and the decision to adopt the stage name 'Flay'. I cannot tell you the number of times Kristin has muttered the words, That guy goes beyond ridiculous. That guy is ricockulous. RI-COCK-U-LOUS. Yes, it is true -- I loves the ricockulous.
Anyhoo, back to Mr. Photo. I'm not quite sure what his particular ricockulosity was. He was Jewish, and had a big mess of curly hair, and was an old hippie. He told me I should date his son. He suggested colleges I should attend, the ones where "all the flaming weirdos" went. I took this as a compliment. He told me about seeing the Doors perform when he and his wife were young, and demonstrated, alone with me in the classroom, how Jim Morrison held the microphone and moved when he sang Light My Fire. It's coming together, isn't it? Kind of ricockulous. What's even more ricockulous is the way I would listen to Abba sing When I Kissed the Teacher, after school, alone in my room. I would dance about, flapping my arms in the way you do when you dance to this song (Come on. Listen to it. Are you flapping? You aren't? You have no soul, zombie thing.) I would sing along, and modify the words to suit my situation: He was leaning over me, trying to explain the laws of Pho-tog-ra-PHEEEEEEEEE… It was a disgraceful display.
One day just before graduation, a couple of days after my eighteenth birthday, I was alone in the classroom with him and my friend Angela. Pulling me on his lap he said, Now that you're eighteen, I guess that means you can sit on my lap. This I was not prepared for. I think I laughed and sort of scooted away or something. It was that unexpected and horrifying and ABSOLUTELY RICOCKULOUS. I mean, WHAT? Where did this come from? It was all so awkward and strange and inappropriate and not in the damn Abba song. Lap sitting? Me? Huh? And what about the underaged Angela, off there to the side, doing something photography related and looking sort of wide eyed and confused? I was NOT, as Abba put it, "in the seventh heaven".
Many years later I went to see the movie American Beauty with my then husband, a "writer" of sorts (and way beyond ricockulous, and not in a good way, as though you needed to ask.) Anyway, there I was, at a movie about a guy who is hot for a high school girl, between the "writer" and a stranger who was truly enjoying the movie. This stranger was clapping and hooting and really relating to the whole thing, like the way you did when you saw Say Anything or Blue Velvet or whatever. I spent the whole movie being kind of ooked out, what between the content of the movie and all the pervy kindred spirit action going on beside me between this man and the giant Spacey on the screen.
When the lights came up I turned to get a look at the creep next to me (that is, the one I was not married to), and saw that it was Mr. Photo who I was sitting beside. Then Mr. P turned to me, and saw that it was I who sat beside him. Talk about awkward. We stared at each other kind of wide-eyed for a moment. I would like to tell you that I said something dry and witty, a la a drunk Winston Churchill, but I did not. Instead I turned and fled. Well played, Qwanty.
***
There were other teachers on whom I have crushed, but no teacher crush has ever been as important as the one I have now. Additionally, I think I've perhaps finally moved away from the ricockulous. This teacher is a Brain Scientist. You would like him. He recently had this exchange with our small child:
BS, to no one in particular: Wow, Keith Richards really looks like a corpse.
BS, Jr.: I wannarida horse!
BS: There is no horse. I said corpse.
BS, Jr.: I wannarida corpse!
BS: No you don't want to ride a corpse, because it is a corpse, and it is Keith Richards, and it is alive.
Charming, no? And not really too ricockulous. Perhaps a bit irresponsible though – I mean, no two-year-old should be looking at a picture of Keith Richards.
As I've mentioned before, the Brain Scientist likes bone marrow, and might advise you to eat some, and will happily give you a lengthy, evolutionary explanation as to why, and you just try and shut him up. Mmmm. Marrowy. Mmmm. Long winded explanations of marrowy. Huh. Perhaps this might be construed as the teensiest bit ricockulous.
The other day the Brain Scientist mentioned, in a very off-handed and entirely serious way, that he would like to start a ninja college. He went on to explain what he meant, and it was not nearly as ricockulous as you might be thinking. I won't share the details, because I think they might be a secret. I will tell you this: it involves more than merely tiptoeing from class to class in pajamas. Perhaps this is not making the case for my move away from ricockularity.
The Brain Scientist has been in many bands, too, one of which had a song called Fuck in a Pile of Bees. And it was a good song! It takes a certain kind of man to pull that off – one who is perhaps a tad ricockulous, but who nonetheless has a certain panache that is not based entirely in the R. Really. I mean it. Oh, wait. I have just questioned him about this song, and I have been informed that the formal title is in fact Erototrauma (Fuck in a Pile of Bees). I stand corrected.
Speaking of songs, the Brain Scientist serenades me quite often with songs he's been involved in. In fact, this happened just now, in the form of an exuberant verse from Spam Pygmalion.
And I quote:
Spam Pygmalion! Spam Pygmalion! Quiver in the gel of your unnatural birth!
Hmmm.
Well now.
I guess some things never change.
Jesus. Do I loves the ricockulous.
a brief rejoinder, dedicated to the one i love
originally posted June 17, 2007
Dr. Brain Scientist, you have recently observed that I am at times emotional and irrational, and have further noted that these states of disequilibrium tend to occur in a monthly cycle, peaking just prior to the period during which I am exiled to a hut at the outskirts of the yard. This information was delivered with an air of exasperated authority, blustering forth from your ever-opinionated, wind-ravaged piehole. Hmmmm. Ass-tute observation, Dr. Brain Scientist. Please allow me to retort. DR. BRAIN SCIENTIST, when recently faced with the question of posole or burritos for dinner, you are a man who declared hominy to be THE CROWN JEWEL IN THE KINGDOM OF STARCHES. FURTHER, you are a man who is known amongst friends for his tendency to pontificate at length, at the slightest provocation, ON THE VIRTUES OF BONE MARROW CONSUMPTION. YOU!!! I am the emotional and irrational one? At least I follow a cycle, doctor. Your madness knows no calendar.
Dr. Brain Scientist, you have recently observed that I am at times emotional and irrational, and have further noted that these states of disequilibrium tend to occur in a monthly cycle, peaking just prior to the period during which I am exiled to a hut at the outskirts of the yard. This information was delivered with an air of exasperated authority, blustering forth from your ever-opinionated, wind-ravaged piehole. Hmmmm. Ass-tute observation, Dr. Brain Scientist. Please allow me to retort. DR. BRAIN SCIENTIST, when recently faced with the question of posole or burritos for dinner, you are a man who declared hominy to be THE CROWN JEWEL IN THE KINGDOM OF STARCHES. FURTHER, you are a man who is known amongst friends for his tendency to pontificate at length, at the slightest provocation, ON THE VIRTUES OF BONE MARROW CONSUMPTION. YOU!!! I am the emotional and irrational one? At least I follow a cycle, doctor. Your madness knows no calendar.
Sunday, September 7, 2008
sympathy for the devil
originally posted June 6, 2007
Now that I'm an adult, I've come to realize that my childhood was filled with weirdness. There are so many stories from my early days that I can't possibly tell a person without the aid of a long, rambling prologue to explain, for example, what I was even doing at a polo match, wearing a fur coat, at age five. These are details a person needs before a person can focus their full attention on the story which I am trying to tell them about my run-in with Sylvester Stallone's bodyguard.
A great deal of the hows and whys for many of these stories can be explained by the fact that, for a period of time, my father was "The Balloon Man". You know those giant hot air balloon-esque things that you see from time to time sitting on the roof of an appliance store during a super blowout sale? This was my father's business for a good deal of the eighties. Not only this, but legend has it that he is the "inventor" of this particular means of advertising, but was unable to patent the idea, because it does not count as an invention if you take some things someone else already invented (e.g., a giant fan, the business end of a hot air balloon) and combine them in a novel fashion. This is something anyone can do, but for a period of time, no one was doing it – no one except my father.
My childhood was filled with gigantic rolls of hot air balloon fabric, industrial sewing machines, dangerous fans that I was not to touch, and huge specialty lightbulbs used for illuminating the balloons at night. My father, with the aid of my mother and a few hired others, would design these balloons, cut them, sew them, and inflate them wherever someone needed to say something by way of a 65-foot balloon. Thus, I often found myself in situations not typically encountered by a small child.
I mention this because I wanted to tell you about The Naz. I knew you'd stop me though, and want to know just how someone even makes the acquaintance of a magician on stilts, let alone ends up with an anecdote about living with one. Knowing that my father was The Balloon Man makes it all make a little more sense, doesn't it? You don't even have to ask, do you? It is obvious to you that someone, somewhere, needed a giant balloon, and they also apparently needed a magician on stilts, and thus The Balloon Man met The Naz.
The Naz actually went by the name 'The Naz', and looked like a more devil-y Wayne Newton – all dyed black hair and tiny mustache. One evening my father received a phone call from The Naz, who shared some sort of sad story about how he and his wife were living in a bus station, I think. I guess the business of magic and stilt walking was not a lucrative one at this point in the eighties. During this phone conversation, my mother held up a note that said I feel sorry for them, and so my father invited them to stay with us for a couple of days. Later that evening, while I slept, my father returned home with The Naz, who was stiltless, and his wife. This was a truly bewildering thing to wake up to the next morning. Even as a small child I understood, as Wayne Newton performed magic tricks for me over toast, that we were in for a long visit.
You see, he wasn't a very good magician. This was an impression my parents and I shared, and I was only nine-years-old, which should tell you that he was actually a horrible magician. Nevertheless, The Naz tried to convince us that he was in fact a very good magician over the three weeks they lived with us. He never had much success, though. For example, at one point he requested that we chain him up with the lock and chain from my bicycle, and from these bounds he would escape – TA DA! Of course this was met with utter failure and wrist bruising, which required the application of ice packs. The humiliation was compounded by the fact that The Naz chained up both my father and aging uncle, and they both got out of the chains in seconds. Indeed, he was a very bad magician.
What made the whole experience particularly strange for me was the fact that I'd sustained a head injury just prior to their arrival – one that required a trip to the emergency room in an ambulance. Subsequent to this I became very sick for a couple of weeks, and spent a good deal of time with a fever that caused a number of fever dreams and weird hallucinations. It is at these points that a young person needs the grounding comfort of the familiar and distinctly non-weird. Of course, having The Naz around made me feel like I was hallucinating 100% of the time.
What happened to The Naz? I don't know. About three weeks into their stay, I heard my mother ask my father, in the urgent whisper of a woman who can take only so much magic, Why are they STILL HERE? It was soon after this that my father dropped The Naz and his wife off at a bus station with money to travel to wherever their relatives lived. After this he returned home and hung my mother's note – I feel sorry for them – on our refrigerator door. There it stayed for years, reminding us all never to be kind to magicians.
Now that I'm an adult, I've come to realize that my childhood was filled with weirdness. There are so many stories from my early days that I can't possibly tell a person without the aid of a long, rambling prologue to explain, for example, what I was even doing at a polo match, wearing a fur coat, at age five. These are details a person needs before a person can focus their full attention on the story which I am trying to tell them about my run-in with Sylvester Stallone's bodyguard.
A great deal of the hows and whys for many of these stories can be explained by the fact that, for a period of time, my father was "The Balloon Man". You know those giant hot air balloon-esque things that you see from time to time sitting on the roof of an appliance store during a super blowout sale? This was my father's business for a good deal of the eighties. Not only this, but legend has it that he is the "inventor" of this particular means of advertising, but was unable to patent the idea, because it does not count as an invention if you take some things someone else already invented (e.g., a giant fan, the business end of a hot air balloon) and combine them in a novel fashion. This is something anyone can do, but for a period of time, no one was doing it – no one except my father.
My childhood was filled with gigantic rolls of hot air balloon fabric, industrial sewing machines, dangerous fans that I was not to touch, and huge specialty lightbulbs used for illuminating the balloons at night. My father, with the aid of my mother and a few hired others, would design these balloons, cut them, sew them, and inflate them wherever someone needed to say something by way of a 65-foot balloon. Thus, I often found myself in situations not typically encountered by a small child.
I mention this because I wanted to tell you about The Naz. I knew you'd stop me though, and want to know just how someone even makes the acquaintance of a magician on stilts, let alone ends up with an anecdote about living with one. Knowing that my father was The Balloon Man makes it all make a little more sense, doesn't it? You don't even have to ask, do you? It is obvious to you that someone, somewhere, needed a giant balloon, and they also apparently needed a magician on stilts, and thus The Balloon Man met The Naz.
The Naz actually went by the name 'The Naz', and looked like a more devil-y Wayne Newton – all dyed black hair and tiny mustache. One evening my father received a phone call from The Naz, who shared some sort of sad story about how he and his wife were living in a bus station, I think. I guess the business of magic and stilt walking was not a lucrative one at this point in the eighties. During this phone conversation, my mother held up a note that said I feel sorry for them, and so my father invited them to stay with us for a couple of days. Later that evening, while I slept, my father returned home with The Naz, who was stiltless, and his wife. This was a truly bewildering thing to wake up to the next morning. Even as a small child I understood, as Wayne Newton performed magic tricks for me over toast, that we were in for a long visit.
You see, he wasn't a very good magician. This was an impression my parents and I shared, and I was only nine-years-old, which should tell you that he was actually a horrible magician. Nevertheless, The Naz tried to convince us that he was in fact a very good magician over the three weeks they lived with us. He never had much success, though. For example, at one point he requested that we chain him up with the lock and chain from my bicycle, and from these bounds he would escape – TA DA! Of course this was met with utter failure and wrist bruising, which required the application of ice packs. The humiliation was compounded by the fact that The Naz chained up both my father and aging uncle, and they both got out of the chains in seconds. Indeed, he was a very bad magician.
What made the whole experience particularly strange for me was the fact that I'd sustained a head injury just prior to their arrival – one that required a trip to the emergency room in an ambulance. Subsequent to this I became very sick for a couple of weeks, and spent a good deal of time with a fever that caused a number of fever dreams and weird hallucinations. It is at these points that a young person needs the grounding comfort of the familiar and distinctly non-weird. Of course, having The Naz around made me feel like I was hallucinating 100% of the time.
What happened to The Naz? I don't know. About three weeks into their stay, I heard my mother ask my father, in the urgent whisper of a woman who can take only so much magic, Why are they STILL HERE? It was soon after this that my father dropped The Naz and his wife off at a bus station with money to travel to wherever their relatives lived. After this he returned home and hung my mother's note – I feel sorry for them – on our refrigerator door. There it stayed for years, reminding us all never to be kind to magicians.
try a little tenderness
originally posted June 5, 2007
As I keep telling myself, a real woman knows how to apologize …
Dear Federally-Funded Grant Group,
I'm sorry I yelled at you. Perhaps I was too quick to anger. You and I have spent enough time together that I should know that you're going to do this sort of thing from time to time. You can't help it. I need to rise above this, and when our relationship is faced with this sort of stress, I should remember the good times. Like that time when your colleague from Amsterdam was visiting, and you had the good Dr. Brain Scientist and me over for breakfast. I was charmed by the way you observed that my name was spelled in the exact same way as the name of a particular rock superstar of the seventies, and how you were so interested in explaining this bit of interest to your visiting guest that you actually left your pancakes in order to put on a song informing us that you wanted to put on your boogie shoes and boogie with us. All this, just so that your visiting colleague would appreciate exactly what it was you were talking about. And it turned out he DID know what you were talking about, and this shared experience of seventies disco goodness moved you so much that you both got up to dance in a disco-y sort of fashion. It was at that point that I knew you cared. I must also confess that I can't stay mad at you knowing that you were concerned that Dr. C might not be having a bachelor party, and took it upon yourself to suggest that perhaps BS might help you in organizing such an event. That was sweet. As it turns out, Dr. BS and I had already discussed this issue, and had concluded that we would have a co-ed function for Drs. C and S – don't worry, grant group, we've got your titties covered! Sorry for being a bombastic shrew.
XOX,
Q
***
Dear BS,
You are the best, even when you are not knocking on doors when you should be, relieving me from my watch over The Tiny Curly Banshee and The Shushinator. Thank you for celebrating my birthday with me on multiple occasions this weekend, and taking me out for sushi and – sigh – MORRISSEY!!!!, all in the same night. Thank you for making the absurdly long drive out to the music venue, located in the middle of a retirement community for some reason, and not making too many jokes related to the fact that this is the same place that Perry Como used to play. And thank you for enjoying the show with me. You didn't even flinch when Morrissey ripped his shirt off – the first time OR the second time – even though you probably thought I liked it a little more than I should have. I like the way you asked me if I was excited about the show over dinner, and told me that you were too, and that you were going to call him morbid and pale. You reminded me that my birthday isn't so bad, and that I probably owe it an apology.
Be seeing you, and I mean this in a good way,
Q
***
Dear Local Newspapers,
I've been thinking about this, and I've made my decision. I hate you, and I hate your ass face.
Until we meet again,
Q
***
Dear Birthday,
Why do we always do this? Will we ever learn? I want you to know that I still enjoy you, despite our recurring scuffles. Thanks to you I had an intoxicated gathering with friends, had sushi with a badass BS, saw Morrissey rip his shirt off – not once, but TWICE! – and had many lovely moments with my wee-uns. All this, and I got to learn yet another amazing fact about the BS. You know how he's always surprising us with tales that we are shocked he never told us before? Like the time he offhandedly mentioned that Alice Cooper used to come into a restaurant he worked at and once left him a handwritten note commending his service, but that he couldn't remember the actual content of this note? And we were all, WHAT THE HELL? YOU CAN'T REMEMBER THE CONTENT OF THE NOTE ALICE COOPER ONCE WROTE YOU??? WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU? and we may have actually said it in a really loud voice like that? Well, he told me another one of those little tidbits. Remember how he used to have those jobs back when he was merely a BS, and not yet a Dr. BS? And one of them involved using his badass karate know-how and bald, goateed intimidation skills to prevent local frat boys from picking fights with men based on their sexual orientation? You know, at that store? On the way home from the Morrissey show a Judas Priest song came on the radio, and Dr. BS mentioned totally offhandedly how a member of Judas Priest (the one usually standing in the middle, in the front) used to come in to this establishment on a very regular basis, and it was not necessarily just to buy books. WHAT???? I said to him. How is it possible that you are JUST NOW mentioning this to me??????? And he was all, "Well, I haven't thought of Judas Priest in, like, ten years." See? He's just so full of surprises! Anyway, sorry for being a snatch about that whole year-older thing.
OOO,
Q
***
Ah. That feels good.
As I keep telling myself, a real woman knows how to apologize …
Dear Federally-Funded Grant Group,
I'm sorry I yelled at you. Perhaps I was too quick to anger. You and I have spent enough time together that I should know that you're going to do this sort of thing from time to time. You can't help it. I need to rise above this, and when our relationship is faced with this sort of stress, I should remember the good times. Like that time when your colleague from Amsterdam was visiting, and you had the good Dr. Brain Scientist and me over for breakfast. I was charmed by the way you observed that my name was spelled in the exact same way as the name of a particular rock superstar of the seventies, and how you were so interested in explaining this bit of interest to your visiting guest that you actually left your pancakes in order to put on a song informing us that you wanted to put on your boogie shoes and boogie with us. All this, just so that your visiting colleague would appreciate exactly what it was you were talking about. And it turned out he DID know what you were talking about, and this shared experience of seventies disco goodness moved you so much that you both got up to dance in a disco-y sort of fashion. It was at that point that I knew you cared. I must also confess that I can't stay mad at you knowing that you were concerned that Dr. C might not be having a bachelor party, and took it upon yourself to suggest that perhaps BS might help you in organizing such an event. That was sweet. As it turns out, Dr. BS and I had already discussed this issue, and had concluded that we would have a co-ed function for Drs. C and S – don't worry, grant group, we've got your titties covered! Sorry for being a bombastic shrew.
XOX,
Q
***
Dear BS,
You are the best, even when you are not knocking on doors when you should be, relieving me from my watch over The Tiny Curly Banshee and The Shushinator. Thank you for celebrating my birthday with me on multiple occasions this weekend, and taking me out for sushi and – sigh – MORRISSEY!!!!, all in the same night. Thank you for making the absurdly long drive out to the music venue, located in the middle of a retirement community for some reason, and not making too many jokes related to the fact that this is the same place that Perry Como used to play. And thank you for enjoying the show with me. You didn't even flinch when Morrissey ripped his shirt off – the first time OR the second time – even though you probably thought I liked it a little more than I should have. I like the way you asked me if I was excited about the show over dinner, and told me that you were too, and that you were going to call him morbid and pale. You reminded me that my birthday isn't so bad, and that I probably owe it an apology.
Be seeing you, and I mean this in a good way,
Q
***
Dear Local Newspapers,
I've been thinking about this, and I've made my decision. I hate you, and I hate your ass face.
Until we meet again,
Q
***
Dear Birthday,
Why do we always do this? Will we ever learn? I want you to know that I still enjoy you, despite our recurring scuffles. Thanks to you I had an intoxicated gathering with friends, had sushi with a badass BS, saw Morrissey rip his shirt off – not once, but TWICE! – and had many lovely moments with my wee-uns. All this, and I got to learn yet another amazing fact about the BS. You know how he's always surprising us with tales that we are shocked he never told us before? Like the time he offhandedly mentioned that Alice Cooper used to come into a restaurant he worked at and once left him a handwritten note commending his service, but that he couldn't remember the actual content of this note? And we were all, WHAT THE HELL? YOU CAN'T REMEMBER THE CONTENT OF THE NOTE ALICE COOPER ONCE WROTE YOU??? WHAT'S WRONG WITH YOU? and we may have actually said it in a really loud voice like that? Well, he told me another one of those little tidbits. Remember how he used to have those jobs back when he was merely a BS, and not yet a Dr. BS? And one of them involved using his badass karate know-how and bald, goateed intimidation skills to prevent local frat boys from picking fights with men based on their sexual orientation? You know, at that store? On the way home from the Morrissey show a Judas Priest song came on the radio, and Dr. BS mentioned totally offhandedly how a member of Judas Priest (the one usually standing in the middle, in the front) used to come in to this establishment on a very regular basis, and it was not necessarily just to buy books. WHAT???? I said to him. How is it possible that you are JUST NOW mentioning this to me??????? And he was all, "Well, I haven't thought of Judas Priest in, like, ten years." See? He's just so full of surprises! Anyway, sorry for being a snatch about that whole year-older thing.
OOO,
Q
***
Ah. That feels good.
cussin', cryin' and carryin' on
originally posted May 30, 2007
Every once in a while, a person just has to scream obscenities into a pillow. Some might instead choose to write an angry letter that is never to be sent. Because I am a person who is impulsive, irrational, and foolheaded, I've chosen to combine these two potentially cathartic, non-bridge-burning approaches into one big clusterfuck of frustration that is bound to bite me in the ass in one way or another. Stand back…
Dear Federally-Funded Grant Group,
Thank you for telling BS that your meeting is to be held every Wednesday. I've set my RA schedule around this. You see, one of the things I get paid to do as a research assistant is to be available at particular hours to answer questions related to statistical analytic procedures and stuff. Because, you know, no one has ever written any of this stuff down in a book, so I need to be there to say it to those who happen by. Thank you for deciding to hold your meeting this week on Tuesday instead of Wednesday. I enjoy re-arranging my schedule around you and your federally funded whims. It's not like I'm entering my SEVENTH year of graduate school – two years beyond which students are typically funded without raised eyebrows. I certainly don't need to seem dependable or anything. And thank you for not bothering to tell BS that you decided to go back to the Wednesday meeting time after all. I enjoyed receiving a phone call yesterday from Dr. C, seven minutes before the scheduled start of said meeting, mentioning that there was in fact NO MEETING ON TUESDAY because everyone sort of changed their mind. It sure was fun phoning the BS as he sat all alone in the conference room, wondering why the fuck no one was there. Getting the boy up mid-nap to retrieve BS kicked ass, too. It was especially convenient that this occurred no more than five minutes after we arrived home after swapping the car and leaving BS at school. And then I thoroughly enjoyed re-arranging my schedule A SECOND TIME IN ONE WEEK to accommodate the shift-from-Wednesday-to-Tuesday-back-to-Wednesday meeting. Again – there's no need for me to appear even vaguely dependable. None! And I found the joking email exchanges between you and BS about how I was all cranky about this scheduling gaff and how he was going to have to sleep on the couch over this one and HA HA HA really funny! Oh, and by the way, I wholeheartedly enjoyed entertaining two children on the campus of Ass Suck University for two hours today while BS was at your fun circle jerk, I mean meeting, so that I might have time to squeeze in a smidgen of work in the morning, but not piss away the afternoon driving home, then driving back, and fucking with the boy's naptime and such. Really. CHRIST ON A MOTHERFUCKING CRUTCH! THANKS! I'M REALLY GLAD YOU'RE SO CONSCIENTIOUS ABOUT THE FACT THAT I HAVE A JOB I'D LIKE TO KEEP! FUCK!
Go directly to hell,
Qwanty, M.A.
Graduate Student in Tomfuckery
Ass Suck University
***
Dear BS,
Thanks for coming to my office after your meeting today but not bothering to knock on my door because you assumed the closed door meant that I wasn't there, and was instead merrily tooling about campus with two happy children. You know how the three of us adore the heat, especially when it's in the triple digits. Thanks for not considering the fact that the door might be closed as a means of concealing the fact that a child was within, shrieking at regular intervals. Do you know what the people I work with love? Screaming toddlers! It's one of the reasons they've hired me – because I can be counted on to provide them with shrieking toddler background sounds. I've been told that it really facilitates their work, hearing a small boy cry No I WON'T! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! every time I request he stop waving a pointy pencil in the vicinity of his eyes. The also adore the absurdly loud SHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH his sister can generate in response to his defiant moo. They've commended me on the robustness of her shushing abilities, and hope I can drag out my PhD just a bit longer so that they might have ample future opportunities to be sustained through their long workdays with the sound of SHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!! coming from my office. I've also heard they're thrilled with their decision to position my office right by the front desk, so that I might share the sounds of my loins with the whole mother fucking place. And when I finally located you from my position way up on the third floor where your meeting had been, but had clearly ended some time earlier, as suggested by the darkened room with no one nearby – do you remember this? You were all the way on the ground floor chatting it up with Dr. C, totally oblivious to the fact that I was about to have a nervous breakdown due to all the shrieking and shushing? And I had to call down to you from the third floor while trying to contain my imminent implosion? Thanks for coming up to meet me and being all pissed off that Drs. C and K and N noted that I seemed cross. That really helped, YOU GODDAMN NO DOOR KNOCKING, CAN'T EFFECTIVELY COMMUNICATE WITH YOUR COLLEAGUES BS BS! I CAN'T WAIT TO TENDERLY CARESS YOUR ASS WITH MY FOOT IN A THRUSTING, POINTY-TOED FASHION!
Be seeing you,
Q
***
Dear Local Newspapers,
Thank you, the both of you, for running a lovely story about the study that Dr. BS and I and two others are doing with the local fire department. Did you know that I put Dr. BS in touch with the fire department when they were seeking someone to do a study on the impact of high call volumes because I have a grasp of what these people needed? Do you understand that I am acting as a methodology person on this project, and am faced with the analysis of a great deal of data with a rather complicated structure? You should, because Dr. BS told you this and asked that everyone on this project be included in this story because even Dr. BS understands that no BS works alone. Sadly, no one else knows, because you MADE NO MENTION OF ANY OF THIS WHATSOEVER, YOU KNOW, HOW THERE ARE OTHER PEOPLE INVOLVED IN THIS AND PISS FUCK SHIT. I'm not in this for any kind of publicity, but it sort of would have been nice to be acknowledged in some tiny way. Maybe you could have fit this in within some of the space you devoted to the three separate pictures you printed of BS looking studiously at firefighting stuff? Like the one where my daughter remarked Look! It's a picture of BS touching his tiny beard! I understand that the public needs to see this sort of thing, to understand that this man IS A MOTHERFUCKING SCIENTIST AND ALL WHO TOUCHES HIS TINY BEARD WHEN DEEP IN THOUGHT, but seriously, we're doing this for free and at this point in my academic career I really need a clipping from The Satan's Nethers Tribune to hang over my desk featuring my name to remind me that there is a point to all this. GODDAMN IT! GODDAMN IT TO HELL! AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!
A concerned reader,
Ms. Q. Wanty
***
Dear Birthday,
Thank you for coming in two days. I look forward to the way this will finally allow my friend Matt to remind me regularly that I'M OLDER THAN JESUS! THIS WILL BE GREAT FUN!NOW FUCK OFF!
love,
Me
***
Phew. I needed that! And now I need a hug.
Every once in a while, a person just has to scream obscenities into a pillow. Some might instead choose to write an angry letter that is never to be sent. Because I am a person who is impulsive, irrational, and foolheaded, I've chosen to combine these two potentially cathartic, non-bridge-burning approaches into one big clusterfuck of frustration that is bound to bite me in the ass in one way or another. Stand back…
Dear Federally-Funded Grant Group,
Thank you for telling BS that your meeting is to be held every Wednesday. I've set my RA schedule around this. You see, one of the things I get paid to do as a research assistant is to be available at particular hours to answer questions related to statistical analytic procedures and stuff. Because, you know, no one has ever written any of this stuff down in a book, so I need to be there to say it to those who happen by. Thank you for deciding to hold your meeting this week on Tuesday instead of Wednesday. I enjoy re-arranging my schedule around you and your federally funded whims. It's not like I'm entering my SEVENTH year of graduate school – two years beyond which students are typically funded without raised eyebrows. I certainly don't need to seem dependable or anything. And thank you for not bothering to tell BS that you decided to go back to the Wednesday meeting time after all. I enjoyed receiving a phone call yesterday from Dr. C, seven minutes before the scheduled start of said meeting, mentioning that there was in fact NO MEETING ON TUESDAY because everyone sort of changed their mind. It sure was fun phoning the BS as he sat all alone in the conference room, wondering why the fuck no one was there. Getting the boy up mid-nap to retrieve BS kicked ass, too. It was especially convenient that this occurred no more than five minutes after we arrived home after swapping the car and leaving BS at school. And then I thoroughly enjoyed re-arranging my schedule A SECOND TIME IN ONE WEEK to accommodate the shift-from-Wednesday-to-Tuesday-back-to-Wednesday meeting. Again – there's no need for me to appear even vaguely dependable. None! And I found the joking email exchanges between you and BS about how I was all cranky about this scheduling gaff and how he was going to have to sleep on the couch over this one and HA HA HA really funny! Oh, and by the way, I wholeheartedly enjoyed entertaining two children on the campus of Ass Suck University for two hours today while BS was at your fun circle jerk, I mean meeting, so that I might have time to squeeze in a smidgen of work in the morning, but not piss away the afternoon driving home, then driving back, and fucking with the boy's naptime and such. Really. CHRIST ON A MOTHERFUCKING CRUTCH! THANKS! I'M REALLY GLAD YOU'RE SO CONSCIENTIOUS ABOUT THE FACT THAT I HAVE A JOB I'D LIKE TO KEEP! FUCK!
Go directly to hell,
Qwanty, M.A.
Graduate Student in Tomfuckery
Ass Suck University
***
Dear BS,
Thanks for coming to my office after your meeting today but not bothering to knock on my door because you assumed the closed door meant that I wasn't there, and was instead merrily tooling about campus with two happy children. You know how the three of us adore the heat, especially when it's in the triple digits. Thanks for not considering the fact that the door might be closed as a means of concealing the fact that a child was within, shrieking at regular intervals. Do you know what the people I work with love? Screaming toddlers! It's one of the reasons they've hired me – because I can be counted on to provide them with shrieking toddler background sounds. I've been told that it really facilitates their work, hearing a small boy cry No I WON'T! EEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! every time I request he stop waving a pointy pencil in the vicinity of his eyes. The also adore the absurdly loud SHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH his sister can generate in response to his defiant moo. They've commended me on the robustness of her shushing abilities, and hope I can drag out my PhD just a bit longer so that they might have ample future opportunities to be sustained through their long workdays with the sound of SHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!! coming from my office. I've also heard they're thrilled with their decision to position my office right by the front desk, so that I might share the sounds of my loins with the whole mother fucking place. And when I finally located you from my position way up on the third floor where your meeting had been, but had clearly ended some time earlier, as suggested by the darkened room with no one nearby – do you remember this? You were all the way on the ground floor chatting it up with Dr. C, totally oblivious to the fact that I was about to have a nervous breakdown due to all the shrieking and shushing? And I had to call down to you from the third floor while trying to contain my imminent implosion? Thanks for coming up to meet me and being all pissed off that Drs. C and K and N noted that I seemed cross. That really helped, YOU GODDAMN NO DOOR KNOCKING, CAN'T EFFECTIVELY COMMUNICATE WITH YOUR COLLEAGUES BS BS! I CAN'T WAIT TO TENDERLY CARESS YOUR ASS WITH MY FOOT IN A THRUSTING, POINTY-TOED FASHION!
Be seeing you,
Q
***
Dear Local Newspapers,
Thank you, the both of you, for running a lovely story about the study that Dr. BS and I and two others are doing with the local fire department. Did you know that I put Dr. BS in touch with the fire department when they were seeking someone to do a study on the impact of high call volumes because I have a grasp of what these people needed? Do you understand that I am acting as a methodology person on this project, and am faced with the analysis of a great deal of data with a rather complicated structure? You should, because Dr. BS told you this and asked that everyone on this project be included in this story because even Dr. BS understands that no BS works alone. Sadly, no one else knows, because you MADE NO MENTION OF ANY OF THIS WHATSOEVER, YOU KNOW, HOW THERE ARE OTHER PEOPLE INVOLVED IN THIS AND PISS FUCK SHIT. I'm not in this for any kind of publicity, but it sort of would have been nice to be acknowledged in some tiny way. Maybe you could have fit this in within some of the space you devoted to the three separate pictures you printed of BS looking studiously at firefighting stuff? Like the one where my daughter remarked Look! It's a picture of BS touching his tiny beard! I understand that the public needs to see this sort of thing, to understand that this man IS A MOTHERFUCKING SCIENTIST AND ALL WHO TOUCHES HIS TINY BEARD WHEN DEEP IN THOUGHT, but seriously, we're doing this for free and at this point in my academic career I really need a clipping from The Satan's Nethers Tribune to hang over my desk featuring my name to remind me that there is a point to all this. GODDAMN IT! GODDAMN IT TO HELL! AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!
A concerned reader,
Ms. Q. Wanty
***
Dear Birthday,
Thank you for coming in two days. I look forward to the way this will finally allow my friend Matt to remind me regularly that I'M OLDER THAN JESUS! THIS WILL BE GREAT FUN!NOW FUCK OFF!
love,
Me
***
Phew. I needed that! And now I need a hug.
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
show me the money, but please don't tell anyone
originally posted May 21, 2007
I am ashamed. The other day the Scorpions came on the radio, sparking the following exchange:
BS: Who the hell listens to this?
Q: Some people do. Some people get really excited when the Scorps come on and turn it up and sing and stuff. I don't get it. That sort of thing should be reserved for Guns N' Roses.
BS: Are you joking?
Q: Yes?
I am a liar. What I meant was No. I really like Paradise City.
When I am busy driving around town and screaming at people, a really good radio moment is a special thing. I know we're living in the days of Ipods and burnable CDs and listening to whatever you want whenever you want and all, but when you haven't figured out how to turn on your MP3 player and you own a car that only has a tape deck and said tape deck isn't working because it got tired of playing the same six songs on your favorite Cure tape over and over again and finally said Screw you, sing Caterpillar Girl to yourself. That Cata-cata-cata part HURTS, you miserable twat a good radio moment still means something. It's the very best when 3 of the 4 stations you have programmed into your radio are all playing Phil Collins, and you just can't get away from Phil, and you keep punching buttons and jumping back and forth from Phil to Phil to Phil, but it JUST WON"T STOP and where is REO Speedwagon or Dio or even Cheap Trick? Then, just when you're about to rip out the fucking radio and pitch it out the window to wither in the dry, dusty heat of Satan's Nethers, something happens. Say, Paradise City comes on. And maybe you secretly love Paradise City. Or Fat Bottomed Girls, which maybe you openly love and are playing right now at this very moment. And maybe you get to hear it from the very beginning, and then suddenly you can barely drive because you've begun to dance with the steering wheel and are tapping the brake in time to the music and you almost have to pull over to devote your full attention to this effort and take a moment to reflect on how happy Queen makes you. And maybe, if the song is 'Somebody to Love', you are crying tears of joy. Maybe.
I don't think it's fair to say that I have excellent taste in music. While it is true that I like music that is excellent, it is also true that I like other music as well. I have what I refer to as "kitchen music". This is music that I perhaps own on cassette, but would never purchase on CD to enable living room listening. This is music that is played only on the little radio my daughter gave my for mother's day when she was two, and only in the kitchen. I keep the kitchen music in a drawer in the kitchen, near the radio. It's a sort of humiliating collection. There's Air Supply's Greatest Hits – I love 'Lost in Love'. I have George Michael's Listen Without Prejudice, Vol. Just Try and Listen Without Self-Loathing. Let us not forget the cassette single for 'Your Woman' by Whitetown. The only justifiable cassette in the whole lot is Elton John's Greatest Hits, Vol. III (given to me by Kristin for my 16th birthday – really, an excellent tape – I once forced Dr. BS to listen to 'Empty Garden', while in the kitchen of course, and it made him weep genuine tears of sadness...)
I've come to mostly accept my love of the KM. What's begun to trouble me, however, are my recent listening transgressions in the car. I have never, ever, ever been a fan of Eddie Money. Never. Not even in the kitchen. Yet the other day 'Two Tickets to Paradise' came on, and I turned it up, before I even processed what it was. It just sounded so good. What? And then – jesus shitballs, I can't believe I'm going to say this – I thought Wow. How romantic. And I meant it. WHAT?! It all happened so fast, I couldn't even censor myself. And now I have to live with this knowledge -- this humiliating little tidbit about myself. It seems I want to be surprised with two tickets to paradise. I want to pack my bags and leave tonight. I've waited so long. Waited so long. Waited so long…
Because I found this little debacle so troubling, I looked up the lyrics to this song, just to be absolutely clear what it was I was jonesing for. You know what? This didn't make me feel better. It turns out there's no actual mention of a plane or any other specific mode of transportation, and no details to speak of – just this promise of paradise and immediate departure. Now I'm thinking that this might just be a big euphemism for sex with Eddie Money, and paradise is in his pants, and these goddamn tickets are fucking free. In fact, he might even pay you to take them. Goddamn it.
It gets worse. As recently as the day before yesterday 'Hollywood Nights' came on the radio and I turned it up because I THOUGHT IT WAS EDDIE MONEY and I wasn't at all disturbed about this until I realized it was in fact Bob Seeger. WHAT?!? Suddenly Eddie Money is OKAY? Again, this all happened before I could process what was going on, and by the time I realized what was happening I was already dancing with the steering wheel and tapping the brake and singing along, for fuck sake, and then I nearly had to pull the goddamn car over, because I was crying. Yes, crying – big old tears of SHAME. Who am I? What have I become? It's all so depressing…
I am ashamed. The other day the Scorpions came on the radio, sparking the following exchange:
BS: Who the hell listens to this?
Q: Some people do. Some people get really excited when the Scorps come on and turn it up and sing and stuff. I don't get it. That sort of thing should be reserved for Guns N' Roses.
BS: Are you joking?
Q: Yes?
I am a liar. What I meant was No. I really like Paradise City.
When I am busy driving around town and screaming at people, a really good radio moment is a special thing. I know we're living in the days of Ipods and burnable CDs and listening to whatever you want whenever you want and all, but when you haven't figured out how to turn on your MP3 player and you own a car that only has a tape deck and said tape deck isn't working because it got tired of playing the same six songs on your favorite Cure tape over and over again and finally said Screw you, sing Caterpillar Girl to yourself. That Cata-cata-cata part HURTS, you miserable twat a good radio moment still means something. It's the very best when 3 of the 4 stations you have programmed into your radio are all playing Phil Collins, and you just can't get away from Phil, and you keep punching buttons and jumping back and forth from Phil to Phil to Phil, but it JUST WON"T STOP and where is REO Speedwagon or Dio or even Cheap Trick? Then, just when you're about to rip out the fucking radio and pitch it out the window to wither in the dry, dusty heat of Satan's Nethers, something happens. Say, Paradise City comes on. And maybe you secretly love Paradise City. Or Fat Bottomed Girls, which maybe you openly love and are playing right now at this very moment. And maybe you get to hear it from the very beginning, and then suddenly you can barely drive because you've begun to dance with the steering wheel and are tapping the brake in time to the music and you almost have to pull over to devote your full attention to this effort and take a moment to reflect on how happy Queen makes you. And maybe, if the song is 'Somebody to Love', you are crying tears of joy. Maybe.
I don't think it's fair to say that I have excellent taste in music. While it is true that I like music that is excellent, it is also true that I like other music as well. I have what I refer to as "kitchen music". This is music that I perhaps own on cassette, but would never purchase on CD to enable living room listening. This is music that is played only on the little radio my daughter gave my for mother's day when she was two, and only in the kitchen. I keep the kitchen music in a drawer in the kitchen, near the radio. It's a sort of humiliating collection. There's Air Supply's Greatest Hits – I love 'Lost in Love'. I have George Michael's Listen Without Prejudice, Vol. Just Try and Listen Without Self-Loathing. Let us not forget the cassette single for 'Your Woman' by Whitetown. The only justifiable cassette in the whole lot is Elton John's Greatest Hits, Vol. III (given to me by Kristin for my 16th birthday – really, an excellent tape – I once forced Dr. BS to listen to 'Empty Garden', while in the kitchen of course, and it made him weep genuine tears of sadness...)
I've come to mostly accept my love of the KM. What's begun to trouble me, however, are my recent listening transgressions in the car. I have never, ever, ever been a fan of Eddie Money. Never. Not even in the kitchen. Yet the other day 'Two Tickets to Paradise' came on, and I turned it up, before I even processed what it was. It just sounded so good. What? And then – jesus shitballs, I can't believe I'm going to say this – I thought Wow. How romantic. And I meant it. WHAT?! It all happened so fast, I couldn't even censor myself. And now I have to live with this knowledge -- this humiliating little tidbit about myself. It seems I want to be surprised with two tickets to paradise. I want to pack my bags and leave tonight. I've waited so long. Waited so long. Waited so long…
Because I found this little debacle so troubling, I looked up the lyrics to this song, just to be absolutely clear what it was I was jonesing for. You know what? This didn't make me feel better. It turns out there's no actual mention of a plane or any other specific mode of transportation, and no details to speak of – just this promise of paradise and immediate departure. Now I'm thinking that this might just be a big euphemism for sex with Eddie Money, and paradise is in his pants, and these goddamn tickets are fucking free. In fact, he might even pay you to take them. Goddamn it.
It gets worse. As recently as the day before yesterday 'Hollywood Nights' came on the radio and I turned it up because I THOUGHT IT WAS EDDIE MONEY and I wasn't at all disturbed about this until I realized it was in fact Bob Seeger. WHAT?!? Suddenly Eddie Money is OKAY? Again, this all happened before I could process what was going on, and by the time I realized what was happening I was already dancing with the steering wheel and tapping the brake and singing along, for fuck sake, and then I nearly had to pull the goddamn car over, because I was crying. Yes, crying – big old tears of SHAME. Who am I? What have I become? It's all so depressing…
mama fun
originally posted April 14, 2007
Happy Mother's Day, muthas. I hope you had a lovely one. What did I get, you ask? Well, in addition to the traditional gifts 'n' such, I got a keyboard full of vomit. I so love it when the little ones make things for me themselves. Sadly, I was not there to witness the actual presentation of the gift, but I am relishing the aftermath, which includes 1) a huge stain on the carpet, 2) a keyboard full of eggs and pool water, 3) a computer that no longer functions, 4) a tasty cake of self-loathing made for me, by me, because I am the sort of person who never bothers to back anything up, and thus I have potentially lost all that was on that computer, which was pretty much everything:
a) the final version of my comprehensive exam – the largest academic undertaking of my quarter-century-plus years of schooling. Yes, I already turned it in, but I sort of wanted to keep a copy of it and, you know, not have to re-type 130 equations
b) Hours and hours and hours and hours and hours of statistical analyses
c) Everything non-academic I've written over the past year, which is really not much of a loss
d) Many pictures of my children, and of myself pregnant with BS "Sharp Shooter" Pukington, Jr.
e) Etc.
I had this coming. I really did.
Mother's Day didn't totally blow, however. In addition to the fun gifts and snuggles and stuff, I also got to participate in this little gem of a conversation with my father, which you will not appreciate unless you've been poking around these parts for awhile, and are familiar with the "living room snacks" (and even then, I can understand if you don't appreciate this):
Dad: Do you remember the containers of snacks we used to keep in the living room?
Q: (quaking with barely contained laughter) Why yes, I do.
D: The pretzels and mustard?
Q: (still quaking) Funny you should mention that. I remember them well.
D: We have snacks again!
Q: (tearing up) Mmphmpphhmphmmm?
D: (gesturing with both hands) This time in big containers!
Q: Wow. Those look like some big containers.
D: We have pretzels and mustard and peanuts. In big containers!
Q: (beginning retreat to other room to laugh hysterically into pillow)
D: (calling after Q) And cheese curls! Great big containers!
Wow. That must be some killer connection to necessitate living room snacks in such vast quantities.
**********************************
Now, because this was a day about moms, here is an exchange I had with my mom, circa 1990. This is an interactive one, so be prepared to participate!
M: Honey, your Dad and I trust you and Ryan won't do anything to disappoint us.
Q: Huh?
M: You won't do anything to disappoint us.
M: (Long pause) Honey, when boys get excited, their little thing, well….
(Here's where you join in -- follow the bouncing balls! Make a fist with your right hand. Hold it in front of you, so your thumb side is facing you and your knuckles point left. Now, stick out your index finger and point at that asshat over there. Next, sort of curl your index finger downwards, so that it looks like a limp penis. Got it? Good. Hold that position.)
M: Does this…
(Your turn again. Ever so slowly – painfully, mortifyingly slowly – straighten your finger out until you are pointing to the ceiling, over there in the corner. Does your finger appear erect? Good job – you've done it right!)
Q: Um. (long silence)
M: (long meaningful look over erect finger-penis)
Q: Well, okay. Thanks. Do we have any macaroni salad? I love that macaroni salad you make.
************************************************************
There you have it: Ma Qwanty's Sex Talk. Share it with someone you love. I'm now going to crawl under my desk and cry and hope for the safe recovery of my hard drive, and make finger-penises until I have blue-thumb. Goodbye for now.
Happy Mother's Day, muthas. I hope you had a lovely one. What did I get, you ask? Well, in addition to the traditional gifts 'n' such, I got a keyboard full of vomit. I so love it when the little ones make things for me themselves. Sadly, I was not there to witness the actual presentation of the gift, but I am relishing the aftermath, which includes 1) a huge stain on the carpet, 2) a keyboard full of eggs and pool water, 3) a computer that no longer functions, 4) a tasty cake of self-loathing made for me, by me, because I am the sort of person who never bothers to back anything up, and thus I have potentially lost all that was on that computer, which was pretty much everything:
a) the final version of my comprehensive exam – the largest academic undertaking of my quarter-century-plus years of schooling. Yes, I already turned it in, but I sort of wanted to keep a copy of it and, you know, not have to re-type 130 equations
b) Hours and hours and hours and hours and hours of statistical analyses
c) Everything non-academic I've written over the past year, which is really not much of a loss
d) Many pictures of my children, and of myself pregnant with BS "Sharp Shooter" Pukington, Jr.
e) Etc.
I had this coming. I really did.
Mother's Day didn't totally blow, however. In addition to the fun gifts and snuggles and stuff, I also got to participate in this little gem of a conversation with my father, which you will not appreciate unless you've been poking around these parts for awhile, and are familiar with the "living room snacks" (and even then, I can understand if you don't appreciate this):
Dad: Do you remember the containers of snacks we used to keep in the living room?
Q: (quaking with barely contained laughter) Why yes, I do.
D: The pretzels and mustard?
Q: (still quaking) Funny you should mention that. I remember them well.
D: We have snacks again!
Q: (tearing up) Mmphmpphhmphmmm?
D: (gesturing with both hands) This time in big containers!
Q: Wow. Those look like some big containers.
D: We have pretzels and mustard and peanuts. In big containers!
Q: (beginning retreat to other room to laugh hysterically into pillow)
D: (calling after Q) And cheese curls! Great big containers!
Wow. That must be some killer connection to necessitate living room snacks in such vast quantities.
**********************************
Now, because this was a day about moms, here is an exchange I had with my mom, circa 1990. This is an interactive one, so be prepared to participate!
M: Honey, your Dad and I trust you and Ryan won't do anything to disappoint us.
Q: Huh?
M: You won't do anything to disappoint us.
M: (Long pause) Honey, when boys get excited, their little thing, well….
(Here's where you join in -- follow the bouncing balls! Make a fist with your right hand. Hold it in front of you, so your thumb side is facing you and your knuckles point left. Now, stick out your index finger and point at that asshat over there. Next, sort of curl your index finger downwards, so that it looks like a limp penis. Got it? Good. Hold that position.)
M: Does this…
(Your turn again. Ever so slowly – painfully, mortifyingly slowly – straighten your finger out until you are pointing to the ceiling, over there in the corner. Does your finger appear erect? Good job – you've done it right!)
Q: Um. (long silence)
M: (long meaningful look over erect finger-penis)
Q: Well, okay. Thanks. Do we have any macaroni salad? I love that macaroni salad you make.
************************************************************
There you have it: Ma Qwanty's Sex Talk. Share it with someone you love. I'm now going to crawl under my desk and cry and hope for the safe recovery of my hard drive, and make finger-penises until I have blue-thumb. Goodbye for now.
10 things
originally posted May 8, 2007
I have been tagged by Cognosco to write 10 weird facts about myself. It is then my task to tag 10 other people to do the same. Unfortunately, I have no friends, so I may be dropping the ball on that part of the deal. Because some of these will no doubt be annoyingly wordy, I will highlight the important points so as to facilitate the wade through the bullshite.
Okay. 10 things:
1) When I was in high school, we had to form little groups and put on puppet shows in drama class. Kristin and another girl and I decided to do a Barbara Walters special with an interview with Terrence Trent D'Arby (another something ridiculous motivated by a crush, no doubt), complete with the Madonna 'Like a Prayer' pepsi commercial. Kristin made a choir on a stick – an entire choir – with little 'o' shaped mouths. I made Terrence Trent D'Arby out of a fey little beige sock. He had dreadlocks and that hat TTD'A always wore. I wonder where he is now? I ask this with regard to both man and sock.
2) When I'm in need of cheering up, this is what I do. First, I go here:
http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/sam
Then, I sit at my computer quietly, waiting. I do other things until some well-meaning yahoo (i.e., BS) comes by and offers some unsolicited piece of advice. It's usually not a long wait, because BS is absolutely brimming with such things. Then, I click on the upper-left-most option and try to look bad ass. Try it. It feels GREAT.
3) I can't wink with my left eye, and only recently learned that there are people who can wink with both eyes (independently of one another, that is. When you wink with both eyes at the same time it is called "blinking", which I do with surprising ease.)
4) I have recurring unpleasant dreams in which either a) I am forced to skydive, b) my teeth crumble in my mouth, c) I have a huge slimy wad of gum in my mouth that I must get rid of, but I can neither spit it out nor swallow it, as it is so slimy and huge. Go figure.
5) I used to LOVE Jethro Tull until I saw them live last year and Ian Anderson made a ton of asshat remarks about the sexy female violinist who was performing with them. Seriously Ian, you tooly flautist, you cannot prance around on stage in tights and say things about keeping your young violinist chained up and expect me to ever listen to Bungle in the Jungle again, no matter how much I like that song. Do you understand that whenever you come on the radio I remember this and get all cranky and turn you off? Thank you for ruining you for me. A pox on you.
6) I got busted on the last day of my freshman year in high school for having 14 wine coolers at school. It was part of a poorly executed plan to drink for the first time. Motivated by guilt, I volunteered at a hospital that summer and had to deliver containers of bodily fluids to the lab. It was horrid. I'm not really down with carting around the mucus of strangers. Bleh. All in all, it was a pretty traumatic summer, and I don't really think I learned anything.
7) Jeez, none of these things are weird. It turns out I'm a really boring person. Let's try to sexy this up a bit: The day after I moved to SN, I had an unpleasant interaction in the middle of the day with a masturbating stranger in the parking lot of Trader Joe's, of all places. I thought he just wanted my parking spot, but I was wrong. Eeew.
8) It doesn't matter how much I hate you, if I see you eating alone I will get teary and have warm feelings for you.
9) I feel sympathy for inanimate objects, e.g. mushrooms. Say you are a mushroom that has come all this way with your little mushroom pals, from your origins in a little heap of shit to your mushroom destiny as a key player in a sauce I am making. And say I drop you on the floor or deem you too ooky looking to be a part of the sauce. I feel bad for throwing you away, little mushroom.
10) I have a lovely collection of Ren & Stimpy cards, encased in protective plastic sleeves and housed in a special binder. I will show them to you if you like, and serenade you with the Log song.
There. Done. Now I need to make friends and cajole them into participating. Frack.
I have been tagged by Cognosco to write 10 weird facts about myself. It is then my task to tag 10 other people to do the same. Unfortunately, I have no friends, so I may be dropping the ball on that part of the deal. Because some of these will no doubt be annoyingly wordy, I will highlight the important points so as to facilitate the wade through the bullshite.
Okay. 10 things:
1) When I was in high school, we had to form little groups and put on puppet shows in drama class. Kristin and another girl and I decided to do a Barbara Walters special with an interview with Terrence Trent D'Arby (another something ridiculous motivated by a crush, no doubt), complete with the Madonna 'Like a Prayer' pepsi commercial. Kristin made a choir on a stick – an entire choir – with little 'o' shaped mouths. I made Terrence Trent D'Arby out of a fey little beige sock. He had dreadlocks and that hat TTD'A always wore. I wonder where he is now? I ask this with regard to both man and sock.
2) When I'm in need of cheering up, this is what I do. First, I go here:
http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/flash/sam
Then, I sit at my computer quietly, waiting. I do other things until some well-meaning yahoo (i.e., BS) comes by and offers some unsolicited piece of advice. It's usually not a long wait, because BS is absolutely brimming with such things. Then, I click on the upper-left-most option and try to look bad ass. Try it. It feels GREAT.
3) I can't wink with my left eye, and only recently learned that there are people who can wink with both eyes (independently of one another, that is. When you wink with both eyes at the same time it is called "blinking", which I do with surprising ease.)
4) I have recurring unpleasant dreams in which either a) I am forced to skydive, b) my teeth crumble in my mouth, c) I have a huge slimy wad of gum in my mouth that I must get rid of, but I can neither spit it out nor swallow it, as it is so slimy and huge. Go figure.
5) I used to LOVE Jethro Tull until I saw them live last year and Ian Anderson made a ton of asshat remarks about the sexy female violinist who was performing with them. Seriously Ian, you tooly flautist, you cannot prance around on stage in tights and say things about keeping your young violinist chained up and expect me to ever listen to Bungle in the Jungle again, no matter how much I like that song. Do you understand that whenever you come on the radio I remember this and get all cranky and turn you off? Thank you for ruining you for me. A pox on you.
6) I got busted on the last day of my freshman year in high school for having 14 wine coolers at school. It was part of a poorly executed plan to drink for the first time. Motivated by guilt, I volunteered at a hospital that summer and had to deliver containers of bodily fluids to the lab. It was horrid. I'm not really down with carting around the mucus of strangers. Bleh. All in all, it was a pretty traumatic summer, and I don't really think I learned anything.
7) Jeez, none of these things are weird. It turns out I'm a really boring person. Let's try to sexy this up a bit: The day after I moved to SN, I had an unpleasant interaction in the middle of the day with a masturbating stranger in the parking lot of Trader Joe's, of all places. I thought he just wanted my parking spot, but I was wrong. Eeew.
8) It doesn't matter how much I hate you, if I see you eating alone I will get teary and have warm feelings for you.
9) I feel sympathy for inanimate objects, e.g. mushrooms. Say you are a mushroom that has come all this way with your little mushroom pals, from your origins in a little heap of shit to your mushroom destiny as a key player in a sauce I am making. And say I drop you on the floor or deem you too ooky looking to be a part of the sauce. I feel bad for throwing you away, little mushroom.
10) I have a lovely collection of Ren & Stimpy cards, encased in protective plastic sleeves and housed in a special binder. I will show them to you if you like, and serenade you with the Log song.
There. Done. Now I need to make friends and cajole them into participating. Frack.
i might regret this in the morning
originally posted May 4, 2007
6:00:00 – Searing uterine pain.
6:00:30 – Vicodin.
6:00:33 – Beeeeeeeeeer…..
6:45:00 – Party with faculty!
So there I was, talking to a woman who had never ridden a bike. She had never heard of Lizzie Borden either. I guess I can see the Lizzie Borden part happening, maybe, but the bike part? I mean, never? Where did I find this person? I'll tell you – at a party full of math computer people and computer math people and (if it happened they were the variety who has been able to successfully simulate human-human interaction) their spouses. And this woman was none of these people. She was a new faculty member from a seemingly normal area where you assume people ride bikes and know stuff. Naturally, because I was full of merriment and substances, I thought it would be a good idea to tell her about my house ghosties and the zombies I fear. I'd already told another complete stranger who complimented me on my dress that I found dresses to be awesome because they are handy for a person like me who doesn't spend enough time doing laundry – you never need pants! It was that sort of night.
I soon found myself at the cheese table. The good BS had interrupted my conversation with the bike-eschewing luddite to present me with a glass of green tea liqueur, which I promptly seized and ran away with. I needed to figure out the alcohol content of said liqueur so that I could establish an appropriate rate of consumption. Standing about the table I found the following:
1) the guy who at some point may have been a philosophy professor, but now is just the guy who shows up at colloquia all the time and asks long, ridiculous questions;
2) the undergraduate guy who manages the pigeon lab;
3) the new-to-us faculty guy who is supposed to a) be a really big deal, and b) be a really big ass. To wit: The whole reason for this party was to lure another big deal guy to come to our school. Earlier in the day the big deal guy we were luring had given what I've been told was an awesome talk in which he discussed affordances – the idea that objects have affordances, and so you look at objects and appraise what you can do with them and such (I would tell you more, but I wasn't there. I just asked BS to tell me about the notion of affordances, briefly, so that I might better explain it, and he's just going on and on and on. I listened for a while, but now I've given up. He's still talking as I write this. Jeez, now he's just invited me to join a reading group because there's an article I might be interested in and blah blah blah. Note to self: do not ask BS stuff.) Anyway, Awesome Talk used as an example a chair. He explained how you could use it as a tool for flinging a rattlesnake off a porch, for fighting off a lion, etc. I've been told this involved him actually picking up a chair and flinging imaginary rattlesnakes around and fighting off imaginary lions and things like that. I've been told that the momentum he'd built was incredible, and everyone was completely enthralled – I mean, do you know how often that sort of colloquium occurs? A colloquium in which there is a really good talk that involves chairs being hoisted in the air and lions attacking?? Not bloody often! So I've been told that just when Awesome was really making his point, and who knows what was about to happen, Guy 3 Smarty Smart yelled out, "What about a CLOUD? A cloud has no affordances!" Thwap. That is the sound of the gauntlet hitting the ground. Consider it thrown. You have been challenged by Guy 3. Of course this cloud question wrecked the momentum Awesome had going and I'm sure pissed the bejesus out of everyone there because suddenly Awesome had to address the issue of cloud affordances and this put an end to the chair waving. Yes – Guy 3 is THAT guy.
Now, returning to the scene: if you are picturing these men and have conjured up some sexy professorial types, or dorky-sexy busmen (ahem, Kristin, I am talking to you), please stop. These men are not those men. Let me help you with your mental image. First, be sure that Guy 1 is carrying a book bag, the sort you get for free in the mail with address labels from the World Wildlife Federation, and be sure the book bag is crammed full of wrinkled papers and journals from 1973. Now, cover the lower half of Guy 2's face with an enormous, bushy beard, and make it red, but allow him to continue wearing the dorky-sexy bus glasses. Finally, make sure Guy 3 is dressed like Bob Ross, and stop imagining him bald and goateed. Rather, give him hair that has been cut by a flowbee. A homemade flowbee. Your image of me is probably already sufficiently developed – remember, I'm the one who never needs pants, and I am sauced.
The conversation turned to me pretty quickly when I approached the table and smiled at this motley academic crüe. I will spare you the details of the actual conversation, as it wasn't that interesting. As you might have predicted, Guy 1 appeared easily startled, Guy 2 was a pleasant pigeon enthusiast who seemed afraid of me, and Guy 3 was a complete ass. Some words were exchanged as we established who I was, what program I was from, and what I studied. I steered the conversation away from me and on to the topic of pigeons, and Guy 2 was more than happy to wax on about the joys of the lab. I was fixing to ask him if he had a paperclip fetish, but then thought better of it. What I actually thought was "Fuck this", and so I began initiating the nice-to-have-met-you-handshake-goodbye activity so that I could leave. I wanted to go back and find No Bikey and engage her in a conversation that did not involve references to popular culture or those new-fangled penny-farthings.
Before I could get away though, there was a wonderful moment of dork-waddery in which Guy 3 distinguished himself as King Dork of Cheesetable – no easy task, mind you, as he was in the company of some of the finer specimens of D, myself included – by forgetting the name of the only female in the group. (Ahem. Me). Not only that, but he thought my name was Merick. Yeah – Merick. I said, "Dude, that's not even close. That's just his name with an 'M' on it." I pointed my finger at Guy 2 (a.k.a. "Erick"), smiled and shook my head sadly at Guy 3, tipped my glass to Guy 1, and wandered away.
It seemed the conversation wasn't over. Guy 3 followed me outside to where I was attempting to hide in a group with BS and other quasi-normal people. I tried to blend into this bunch, but Guy 3 saw me hiding in a chair, marched up to the group, interrupted the conversation and said to me the following:
"So. You're in the quantitative program? Tell me then: in multidimensional scaling, given that it's a linear model, what circumstances would give rise to a toroidal space with a wrap around?"
Jesus. That question again? I should mention that in six years of graduate study, the only time the term 'toroidal' has come up has been during my attempts to plot jumps through hyperspace.
Qwanty: "Yeah, I don't study multidimensional scaling."
Guy 3: "Well, surely you've heard of it."
Q: "Yeah. But I don't study it."
That was all. Flick. Like a tiny, pesky gnat. Get your flowbee'd arse off my arm. I turned and resumed conversation. It was later reported to me that Flowbs looked like he'd been kicked in the chest, so uninterested was I in his little beer spattered gauntlet. Hooray Vicodin!
6:00:00 – Searing uterine pain.
6:00:30 – Vicodin.
6:00:33 – Beeeeeeeeeer…..
6:45:00 – Party with faculty!
So there I was, talking to a woman who had never ridden a bike. She had never heard of Lizzie Borden either. I guess I can see the Lizzie Borden part happening, maybe, but the bike part? I mean, never? Where did I find this person? I'll tell you – at a party full of math computer people and computer math people and (if it happened they were the variety who has been able to successfully simulate human-human interaction) their spouses. And this woman was none of these people. She was a new faculty member from a seemingly normal area where you assume people ride bikes and know stuff. Naturally, because I was full of merriment and substances, I thought it would be a good idea to tell her about my house ghosties and the zombies I fear. I'd already told another complete stranger who complimented me on my dress that I found dresses to be awesome because they are handy for a person like me who doesn't spend enough time doing laundry – you never need pants! It was that sort of night.
I soon found myself at the cheese table. The good BS had interrupted my conversation with the bike-eschewing luddite to present me with a glass of green tea liqueur, which I promptly seized and ran away with. I needed to figure out the alcohol content of said liqueur so that I could establish an appropriate rate of consumption. Standing about the table I found the following:
1) the guy who at some point may have been a philosophy professor, but now is just the guy who shows up at colloquia all the time and asks long, ridiculous questions;
2) the undergraduate guy who manages the pigeon lab;
3) the new-to-us faculty guy who is supposed to a) be a really big deal, and b) be a really big ass. To wit: The whole reason for this party was to lure another big deal guy to come to our school. Earlier in the day the big deal guy we were luring had given what I've been told was an awesome talk in which he discussed affordances – the idea that objects have affordances, and so you look at objects and appraise what you can do with them and such (I would tell you more, but I wasn't there. I just asked BS to tell me about the notion of affordances, briefly, so that I might better explain it, and he's just going on and on and on. I listened for a while, but now I've given up. He's still talking as I write this. Jeez, now he's just invited me to join a reading group because there's an article I might be interested in and blah blah blah. Note to self: do not ask BS stuff.) Anyway, Awesome Talk used as an example a chair. He explained how you could use it as a tool for flinging a rattlesnake off a porch, for fighting off a lion, etc. I've been told this involved him actually picking up a chair and flinging imaginary rattlesnakes around and fighting off imaginary lions and things like that. I've been told that the momentum he'd built was incredible, and everyone was completely enthralled – I mean, do you know how often that sort of colloquium occurs? A colloquium in which there is a really good talk that involves chairs being hoisted in the air and lions attacking?? Not bloody often! So I've been told that just when Awesome was really making his point, and who knows what was about to happen, Guy 3 Smarty Smart yelled out, "What about a CLOUD? A cloud has no affordances!" Thwap. That is the sound of the gauntlet hitting the ground. Consider it thrown. You have been challenged by Guy 3. Of course this cloud question wrecked the momentum Awesome had going and I'm sure pissed the bejesus out of everyone there because suddenly Awesome had to address the issue of cloud affordances and this put an end to the chair waving. Yes – Guy 3 is THAT guy.
Now, returning to the scene: if you are picturing these men and have conjured up some sexy professorial types, or dorky-sexy busmen (ahem, Kristin, I am talking to you), please stop. These men are not those men. Let me help you with your mental image. First, be sure that Guy 1 is carrying a book bag, the sort you get for free in the mail with address labels from the World Wildlife Federation, and be sure the book bag is crammed full of wrinkled papers and journals from 1973. Now, cover the lower half of Guy 2's face with an enormous, bushy beard, and make it red, but allow him to continue wearing the dorky-sexy bus glasses. Finally, make sure Guy 3 is dressed like Bob Ross, and stop imagining him bald and goateed. Rather, give him hair that has been cut by a flowbee. A homemade flowbee. Your image of me is probably already sufficiently developed – remember, I'm the one who never needs pants, and I am sauced.
The conversation turned to me pretty quickly when I approached the table and smiled at this motley academic crüe. I will spare you the details of the actual conversation, as it wasn't that interesting. As you might have predicted, Guy 1 appeared easily startled, Guy 2 was a pleasant pigeon enthusiast who seemed afraid of me, and Guy 3 was a complete ass. Some words were exchanged as we established who I was, what program I was from, and what I studied. I steered the conversation away from me and on to the topic of pigeons, and Guy 2 was more than happy to wax on about the joys of the lab. I was fixing to ask him if he had a paperclip fetish, but then thought better of it. What I actually thought was "Fuck this", and so I began initiating the nice-to-have-met-you-handshake-goodbye activity so that I could leave. I wanted to go back and find No Bikey and engage her in a conversation that did not involve references to popular culture or those new-fangled penny-farthings.
Before I could get away though, there was a wonderful moment of dork-waddery in which Guy 3 distinguished himself as King Dork of Cheesetable – no easy task, mind you, as he was in the company of some of the finer specimens of D, myself included – by forgetting the name of the only female in the group. (Ahem. Me). Not only that, but he thought my name was Merick. Yeah – Merick. I said, "Dude, that's not even close. That's just his name with an 'M' on it." I pointed my finger at Guy 2 (a.k.a. "Erick"), smiled and shook my head sadly at Guy 3, tipped my glass to Guy 1, and wandered away.
It seemed the conversation wasn't over. Guy 3 followed me outside to where I was attempting to hide in a group with BS and other quasi-normal people. I tried to blend into this bunch, but Guy 3 saw me hiding in a chair, marched up to the group, interrupted the conversation and said to me the following:
"So. You're in the quantitative program? Tell me then: in multidimensional scaling, given that it's a linear model, what circumstances would give rise to a toroidal space with a wrap around?"
Jesus. That question again? I should mention that in six years of graduate study, the only time the term 'toroidal' has come up has been during my attempts to plot jumps through hyperspace.
Qwanty: "Yeah, I don't study multidimensional scaling."
Guy 3: "Well, surely you've heard of it."
Q: "Yeah. But I don't study it."
That was all. Flick. Like a tiny, pesky gnat. Get your flowbee'd arse off my arm. I turned and resumed conversation. It was later reported to me that Flowbs looked like he'd been kicked in the chest, so uninterested was I in his little beer spattered gauntlet. Hooray Vicodin!
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